The personal connections Remembrance Scholars shared this year with the victims of the Pan Am Flight 103 plane crash resonated with the scholars as they participated in the Rose Laying Ceremony on Friday.

Scholar John Tummino’s aunt’s first husband, Jay Giebler, was a victim. The mother of another scholar, Sara Mileski, was friends with another victim, Jason Coker.

“The fact that these students along with me, my fellow scholars, have these really profound personal connections has really made us realize how it reverberates with us. And I think that’s why it’s been really special this year,” said Gabriela Riccardi, a senior magazine journalism major.

Pan Am Flight 103 was carrying 35 SU abroad students, who were returning from London and Florence, when it exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland 26 years ago.

Each year, 35 Remembrance Scholars are chosen to represent the 35 SU students who died on Pan Am Flight 103. The scholars and the students they represent are the centerpiece of the Rose Laying Ceremony, one of the closing events for Remembrance Week.

At the start of the ceremony, the Remembrance Scholars walked in procession out of the Hall of Languages at exactly 2:03 p.m. Each scholar wore a button with a picture of the student they represented on it while holding a white rose close to their chests.

Family members and loved ones of the SU students aboard Pan Am Flight 103 dressed in muted and dark colors. Occasionally, there were hints of bright orange, a tie or a scarf, which signaled that this was not a funeral filled with grief, but a memorial that honors each student who died in the terrorist attack.

Leading the service, Tummino, a senior broadcast and digital journalism and political science dual major, said the rose laying service is a physical memorial for all those lost on Pan Am Flight 103.

Tummino later invoked the motto of the Remembrance Scholars, Look Back, Act Forward, which served as a theme throughout the service.

“We look back and remember those lost while we act forward, consciously doing and acting in ways that respect, help and support others in their honor,” Tummino added.

Each scholar then said a sentence or two about the student they represent to the crowd of around 125 people. Every incarnation of a victim, every little speech about a deceased student, ended with the phrase, “I lay this rose on behalf of [student name] and act forward.”

The personal connections exist not only between this year’s scholars and the students who died in Pan Am Flight 103, but also between the families of the victims themselves.

Jane Davis kissed Doris Cory on the cheek after the ceremony in front of the Wall of Remembrance. “I’m so glad to see you, but I’m answering the questions, I’m supposed to be answering the questions, Doris,” Davis told Corey during her interview.

Both Davis and Cory had children who were killed on Pan Am Flight 103. Davis was the mother of Shannon Davis and Cory was the mother of Scott Cory. Now though, they laughed not like mothers who lost their children, but they laughed as sisters who shared loss, grief, pain and joy together over the last 26 years.

“I’ll see you later, Doris, you know I will,” Davis added.

Every year 35 scholars share the lives of the 35 students who died in the Lockerbie Tragedy. However, the scholars and their web of connections from the Pan Am Flight 103 crash change each year as well, Davis said.

“Each year, the students who are the recipients of the scholarship are a joy because everyone’s story is a little bit different,” she said.

Published on October 24, 2014 at 9:11 pm

Contact Rachel: rsandler@syr.edu