WEBVTT

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Chapter 2.

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[INAUDIBLE] "There
are flowers that

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grow mostly in disturbed areas.

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In the middle of May, when I
turned on the University Avenue

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in Tuscaloosa, I was thinking
about those flowers--

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passionflower and mistflower,
morning glory and fleabane.

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A copy of the National
Audubon Society Field

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Guide to the
Southeastern States, which

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I'd spent some time with
the previous evening,

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pressed against my father's
burial flag on the front seat.

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I was thinking
about those flowers,

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and the idea of
those flowers, as I

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rode through the old downtown.

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To be honest, the
phrase 'disturbed areas'

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had always bothered me in my
occasional searches regarding

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plant habitat.

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I really didn't
know what it meant.

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And last night, that
ambiguity seemed suddenly

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strange, almost ominous.

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I could easily imagine
the other landscapes

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offered by the field guide--

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moist pinelands,
meadows, thickets-- even

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the more poetic, rich woods.

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And I could see the
ditches and roadsides

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that some species favored.

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But the phrase 'disturbed
areas' was so abstract.

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If it didn't include marred
ground such as ditches,

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if it meant something more, than
I can envision only horribly

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dug up places,
un-earthed and scarred.

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I was considering
this phrase then,

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as I drove past the rubble
of what was, until recently,

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the home of respectively--

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Norris Radiator, Auto Trim
and Tire, the Firestone Tire

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and Service Center.

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I passed the old post office,
set for destruction next,

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and gazed down Sixth Street,
where soon the Diamond Theater

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would disappear forever, along
with KSV Restaurant, a soul

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food buffet that doubled
as the Orchid Nightclub,

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and the longtime
Tuscaloosa news building.

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City planners had also
scheduled demolition

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for various other businesses.

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Two shoe repair shops, a
barbershop, a pool hall,

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a paint store, an antique shop,
and several furniture stores.

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Maybe the place would be
better off in the end.

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I didn't know.

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It was OK the way it was.

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There were no flowers
springing from these rooms.

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There was not-- this
was not a disturbed

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area, in the strict
sense of the phrase.

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On the other hand, I knew
of at least one place

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that had to be a
disturbed area, if that

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meant a natural location
generally torn up by backhoe.

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The place where the Earth
was moved from here to there,

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trenches dug, and
the ground cleaned.

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Black-eyed Susan,
Venus's looking glass,

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Queen Anne's lace, Carolina
crane's-bill, peppergrass,

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chickweed, fleabane, Southern
dewberry, blue toadflax,

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Asiatic dayflower, painted
leaf, kudzu, poison ivy,

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prickly sow thistle--

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horrible thistle-- at
least some of those

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flowers must have flourished
at the Tri-State Crematory

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blooming among the dead.

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I first learned about
the Tri-State Crematory

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when I glanced up
at the television

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to see emergency workers
in North Georgia rummaging

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through the thick brush
surrounding a rural area.

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At the time, February 2002, I
was living in Portland, Oregon.

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And I distinctly
remember a helicopter

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on screen beating overhead,
filming the workers

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from above at night.

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The spotlight causing
their green jackets

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to flicker on and
off against darkness.

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Apparently, the
workers had uncovered

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a few dozen decomposed
corpses sprawled

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about the crematory grounds.

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The news report explained, there
would be more bodies to come.

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By Sunday morning, authorities
had recovered 95 bodies

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from the Tri-State Crematory
and feared that many more,

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hundreds perhaps, lay scattered
throughout the overgrown

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premises.

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There were accounts
of bodies piled

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in pits, bodies
in shacks, bodies

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stuffed in the metal vaults
beneath a small lake.

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Eventually, after a
series of Gothic events,

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blackly fantastic, the full
extent of the desecration

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was revealed.

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In all, authorities recovered
339 decomposing bodies,

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making the Tri-State
Crematory incident

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the largest mass desecration
in modern American history.

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And the details of the
incident were gruesome,

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to say the least.

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More than 30 of the
bodies were discovered

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in the main crematory
building in two storage sheds,

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either lying on the floor, or
piled high in metal vaults.

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The remaining 300
plus bodies were

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distributed throughout
the dense brush of woods

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at the crematory grounds.

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Of this larger
group, the majority

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were dumped into eight burial
pits of varying depth, which

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were then covered
with dirt, trash,

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and in one instance,
an old pool table.

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Body parts were
found sticking out

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of the pits like grisly
plantings in a neglected

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garden.

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The skeletal remains
of other bodies

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were strewn haphazardly
throughout the brush

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on cardboard and
plywood burn pallets.

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Still others were
discovered in discarded body

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bags beneath the pines.

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Finally, a small group
still lay in their caskets.

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Generally cremation
does not involve

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the added expense of a casket.

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And the rats had found their
way into those enclosures,

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shuffling the bones.

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My father's bones
were among those

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found at Tri-State, where he
lay abandoned for five years.

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And for five years,
the crematory backhoe

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dug pits and built mounds.

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Divided the Earth,
and piled it up.

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Opened the ground,
and closed it.

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The metal edge leveled
trees and heavy brush,

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crushed kudzu and passionflower,
chickweed and thistle--

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in so doing, made a new place
for all those things to grow."

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[APPLAUSE]