BEAVERCREEK — The City of Beavercreek takes pride in its 9/11 Memorial, erected on Dayton-Xenia Road near State Route 35. A renewed pride arises through a gift provided by former Mayor Scott Hadley who keeps giving to the city he cherishes. Hadley presented the city with a 9/11 shadow box recently.
In the spring of 2012, a storm took out a mature cherry tree in the Hadley’s yard. The former mayor had a dream for the remains that came to fruition this month.
“I had in mind what I wanted made with this wood,” Hadley said. “I hauled it to my driveway close to my house and stacked it to be used later.”
It wasn’t until he was speaking of it during a Rotary Club meeting that a member, Bill Dye, offered to help him with with the wood. Dye has a woodshop in his basement and agreed to help Hadley with a shadow box and asked if he could have the rest of the cherry wood for his own projects. With an agreement and the help of Dye’s friend to harvest the wood, the project began.
The shadow box was built to hold a folded flag on the top and a twisted piece of metal from the Twin Towers on the bottom.
“Bill said that he would be proud to work on this project,” Hadley said. Dye made cookie jars out of a portion of the cherry tree wood for friends and family.
“The metal from the Twin Towers was something I had our maintenance men remove from the memorial piece for safety when it arrived in Beavercreek. This flag was flown over ground zero in New York and was presented to me while I was Mayor during our tenth anniversary remembrance ceremony. It was presented to me by Attorney General, Mike DeWine on 9/11/11. It was flown next to our memorial for a time,” Hadley said.
As was the 9/11 Memorial, the shadow box and contents were donated and not paid by tax payers. For this shadow box, the flag was cleaned by Long’s Cleaners then ceremoniously folded by two members of VFW Post 8312, they were in full uniform. The Glass Front was donated by A-service Glass, and of course, the box was handcrafted by Dye.
The gift can be viewed at the city building. It was graciously accepted by all. If the city ever decides to retire the display, Hadley requested its return.
