Our Flag Was Still There

By Katie McFadden

For a few weeks, Suzanne Campbell O’Rahilly was on Beach 105th Street, hard at work creating a large American flag made out of shells in time for Memorial Day weekend, in tribute to those who died in service to this country. After spending a day in the sun putting together hundreds of painted shells on May 19, within two hours of leaving the beach, Campbell O’Rahilly noticed that the progress she made took several steps back as someone had purposely trampled through the display. However, by Friday afternoon, May 22, several members of the community came together to help Campbell O’Rahilly restore and complete the flag in time for the holiday weekend.

For the last year or two, creative shell displays have been popping up on Beach 105th Street, from hearts to shamrocks to Easter bunnies and even a tribute to the late Patrick Brady. Some neighbors soon learned the creations were being made by Campbell O’Rahilly, who also spearheads the Remembrance Tree effort on Beach 106th each holiday season. Earlier this month, in her biggest project yet, she set out to create a massive flag for Memorial Day in honor of the fallen. She recycled some of the shells from previous projects, but such a big project required a few more. Putting out a call for shells on social media, several neighbors collected and contributed additional shells for the display.

In the middle of May, Campbell O’Rahilly painted the shells and began laying them out to create the flag. On May 19, witnesses saw a teen girl destroy the display, kicking and damaging shells. Neighbors tried to stop her, but the damage had been done. After posting to social media about the flag being damaged, the community decided that wouldn’t stand.

As the rain took a break for the week on Friday, several neighbors joined Campbell O’Rahilly on Beach 105th Street with a mission of restoring the flag. Using roughly 2,800 shells that she had painted, Campbell O’Rahilly, Dennis Mullen, Chris McGrath, Noel Kaelin, Paul Zinskie and Katie McFadden came together to help her quickly finish the job.

“The intention of the flag display was simply to honor the men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice while serving this country. They may be gone but they will never be forgotten. I also wanted the children to see it as some schools no longer speak about it,” Campbell O’Rahilly said. “This by far is the largest display.”

In addition to those who helped restore the flag, Campbell O’Rahilly thanked others who helped contribute to making it possible, including “Mazzone Ace Hardware, Joe O’Brien, Anne Marie and George, Judy Emiliano, Sammi, Marjorie Kubiak, Bianca, Alice Rodkin, Peter, Tatiana and countless others.”

Like with past projects, Campbell O’Rahilly hopes to recycle the shells for future projects and any leftover unpainted shells will be used for the Remembrance Tree. She’s also seeking a place to store the shells if someone has space. Reach out to Suzanne Campbell O’Rahilly on Facebook if you can help.

Photo by Katie McFadden.