While the space shuttle Endeavour makes its slow way through Los Angeles to its home at the California Science Center, Hermosa Beach Mayor Jeff Duclos is hoping the attention will raise interest in rehabilitating a memorial built for a fallen Hermosa Beach astronaut who died on the Challenger shuttle.
After Greg Jarvis and six others died when the Challenger exploded in 1986, the city completed a $20,000 memorial at 14th Street and The Strand in Jarvis’s honor. The money was raised by local companies and individuals in the wake of the accident.
Duclos said he has ushered many groups and individuals to the rest area in front of Noble Park over the years, but to no avail. People generally agree that the site could use refurbishing, but they also forget about it because they don’t consider it a high priority, Duclos said.
“It’s tough to get people to make that connection to the past, or someone or an event that seems distant or remote. If you are a younger person, the Challenger disaster may not be a part of your memory bank,” Duclos said. “I think there’s an opportunity there. How do we replicate this model that existed before where local people and businesses, and also the aerospace industry, got engaged in this process and supported it and initiated it? How do we get them to possibly re-engage and re-create this tribute to this patriot, who gave his life for his country and is someone who deserves to be remembered properly?”
Although City Manager Tom Bakaly recently told Duclos that the public works department would assess the cost of a cursory rehabilitation of the memorial, Duclos is more interested in creating a new one altogether— one that doesn’t collect debris.
“We could have something very unique and interesting,” Duclos said, adding that Jarvis was an avid bicyclist and the old concrete bicycle ‘stands’ at the memorial are never used. For many years following the Challenger disaster, people placed flowers at the Jarvis memorial on the anniversary, Duclos said.
After Duclos wrote a Letter to the Editor in Easy Reader Oct. 4, he’s heard from a couple of people interested in re-creating the memorial, including one of Jarvis’s former neighbors.
Sam Perrotti, chairman of the city’s planning commission, used to live across Sixth Street from Jarvis and his wife.
Perrotti remembers how Marcia Jarvis used to make cookies for the neighbors at the holidays, and that she and Greg were so often riding their tandem bicycle.
“I remember they flew to Canada and shipped their bicycle with them. They did a lot of bicycling up there and in the South Bay area,” said Perrotti, who Jarvis listed as a reference when he applied to be an astronaut while working for Hughes Aircraft.
The day of the Challenger accident, Perrotti was watching the launch on TV. “The thing I thought of immediately was that I had borrowed his lawn mower and it was still in my garage. [I thought,] Oh my gosh, I’ve got to return it,” Perrotti said. “When something tragic like that happens, you’re in denial. You’re not thinking or you’re thinking of little things.”
Perrotti said he has noticed the vandalism at the memorial as well as garbage collecting at the memorial, and he would very much like to see it improved.
Ken Hartley, president of the Hermosa Beach Amateur Radio Association and member of the city’s Emergency Preparedness Advisory Committee, also contacted Duclos and offered to get involved to improve the Jarvis memorial.
“It needs to be done,” Hartley said. “We’ll have to figure out ways to generate the money to make it happen, but I’m sure we’ll figure that out. This community always comes together for important things.”
Peter Hall of Phoenix enjoys stopping at the Jarvis memorial when he visits Southern California, which is about once or twice a year for 15 years.
“Watching the sunset here is one of the most beautiful things,” Hall said. The cracked bench needs to be replaced and the garbage ought to be cleaned up, Hall said, adding that he thinks of the Challenger crew when he stops at the memorial.
“This is a wonderful place,” Hall said.
