168 Seconds of Silence

With equal measures of anticipation and dread, Oklahoma on Friday marked the first anniversary of the bombing that tore through the nation’s heart April 19 a year ago, a milestone that soothed some mourners but forced others to relive a day they would sooner forget.

Under a sunny spring sky that stood in contrast to the rainy gloom of last year, survivors and relatives of the bombing’s 168 victims gathered at the grassy lot where the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building once stood. At 9:02 a.m., in a tribute repeated across the country, they paused for 168 seconds of silence interrupted only by a baby’s wail.

All 168 names were read at roughly 10-second intervals, adding another 23 minutes of aching quiet. Then to a bagpiper’s dirge, the mourners marched in somber procession through downtown streets. Rescue workers and military officers lined the route, some standing at attention as tears dripped down their starched suits.

The five-block trek ended at Oklahoma City’s convention center, where the survivors and victims’ family members were joined by several thousand others for a morning of hymns and homilies. The event, dubbed Remembrance Day, featured a visit from Vice President Al Gore and a videotaped message from President Clinton.

“Every American was touched by this tragedy and inspired by your courage,” said Clinton, who visited Oklahoma City two weeks ago but was in Russia on Friday for an antinuclear summit. “This is not only a day of mourning; it is also a day of healing and hope.”

Clinton called the Oklahoma victims “ordinary Americans, men and women going about their jobs. . . . And they were our children, full of promise and wonder, the pride and joy of their parents, the lifeblood of our future.”

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During the ceremony, photographs of all 168 victims, from Lucio Aleman Jr. to John A. “Buddy” Youngblood, flashed across a giant screen. Some have become famous, while others remain unknown, but together they formed a poignant portrait of the bomb’s indiscriminate trajectory: a rainbow of men and women, young and old, prosperous and downtrodden, black, white, Latino, Asian and Native American.

The tiniest victims--the 19 children who perished in the terrorist attack, most as they played in the federal building’s day-care center--were saved for the end of this grim roster. By then, sobs had filled the arena, a reaction as much to the children’s guileless faces as to the length of time it took to get to them. Although the number is frequently bandied about, Friday’s ritual served as a reminder of just how staggering a toll 168 can be when counted one by one.

“This day has been kind of like a roller coaster,” said Bud Welch, whose 23-year-old daughter, Julie, was killed in the Social Security Administration’s ground-floor office. “I looked forward to it in a lot of ways, but in others I kind of dreaded it.”

For much of the last year, the anniversary has been a subject of deeply mixed emotions, a somewhat artificial signpost for measuring how far Oklahoma City has come and how far it has to go in the wake of the bombing.

While many saw the day as a necessary hurdle in the healing process, some complained that their grief was still too fresh to begin marking progress. Others, who have been more successful at putting their pain behind them, feared that such a public display would only reopen old wounds. With more than 1,000 members of the media on hand, there was also widespread concern that the anniversary had become a circus--a made-for-TV spectacle rather than a time for quiet reflection.

“It’s natural to remember an anniversary, but it’s not a natural part of the grieving process to have all this hoopla,” said Stewart Beasley, an Oklahoma City psychologist who is counseling the families of several victims.

He called frequent memorializing of the bombing over the last year “attention-drawing and self-serving,” vehicles for politicians, news organizations and would-be celebrities who “have a vested interest in keeping the pain alive.”

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When the day finally arrived, it became clear that many Oklahomans had indeed stayed home. Although officials were bracing for an overflow crowd, the convention center’s 10,000-seat arena was at least one-third empty. By the time Clinton’s message was aired near the end of the service, not even half the seats were filled.

“I think a lot of people are hurting,” said Donna Hawthorne, who wore a photo-button of her husband, Tom, killed while helping a disabled co-worker apply for Social Security benefits. “I think they thought that they couldn’t handle it. But I go beyond that. I see the love.”

Throughout the day, flags were lowered to half-staff and vehicle headlights were turned on, a symbol of solidarity that was adopted shortly after the bombing. Bumper stickers dotting the city offered the reassurance, “We Remember.” The Liberty Tower, a downtown building, configured its office lights to look like a giant cross.

At the convention center, survivors and families of the victims clutched teddy bears and waved penlights fashioned as candles. They bowed their heads in prayer as a multidenominational team of clergymen read from the scriptures, and they rose to their feet in cheers when George Wesley Jr. sang “Wind Beneath My Wings,” his sweet, 13-year-old voice mesmerizing the crowd.

“Healing is an individual matter and no one can tell you where you should be,” said Gov. Frank Keating, who was also greeted with a standing ovation. “But I want you to know that Oklahoma’s heart is strong today.”

Gore echoed those remarks, acknowledging that the grieving has not ended. “Let there be no mistake: One year is a very short time,” he said. “In the human heart, it can be the blink of an eye.”

But he also praised Oklahomans for their spiritual strength. “Your faith has reinforced America’s faith, and we pray that America’s faith has bolstered your own,” he told the audience. “We love you and we want to reach out to you and lift you up anyway we can.”

For Arlene Blanchard, a survivor of the bombing, the service was a cathartic release after a year of pent-up emotion. “It was just like the eye of the tiger--coming face-to-face with it,” said Blanchard, a sergeant in the federal building’s U.S. Army recruiting office. “It blessed my socks off. It hit me right in the heart.”

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But for others, the answers were more elusive, the voids not so easily filled.

Jay Sawyer, whose 51-year-old mother, Dolores Stratton, died in that same Army office, was left only with questions as he stood next to the chain-link fence that marks the site of Stratton’s final day. His 3-year-old son, Jacob, kept asking for grandma.

“He keeps telling me she’s just hiding,” said Sawyer, cradling the boy in his arms. “I don’t know how to explain it. What am I supposed to say?”

Times staff writer John M. Broder in St. Petersburg, Russia, contributed to this story.