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Letter to the editor

Spite is no match for patriotism

By ANDREW SKERRITT, Times Columnist
Published September 9, 2007

Zoli Hegyi of Spring Hill has built a twin towers exhibit in his yard to commemorate the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks since 2002. This year, he did and someone vandalized the exhibit in front of his home. The former New York City police officer has since repaired it.
	[Ron Thompson | Times]

It was a symbol of respect -- one man's homage to the lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001.

Zoli Hegyi erected matching 8-foot-tall wooden boxes on his front lawn on Alderwood Street in Spring Hill. Somebody donated baseball caps from the New York City Fire Department in honor of the 343 firefighters killed after terrorists crashed into the World Trade Center.

Atop his towers, Hegyi placed 10 small American flags.

He did this each year leading up to the anniversary of the attack. Motorists stopped to thank the 39-year-old former New Yorker.

In 2002, he met lots of people. But as time passed, fewer stopped.

This year Hegyi thought he'd draw more attention to his memorial, which he had always illuminated with a simple white light. He got more patriotically creative, if you will, installing red, white and blue bulbs inside the towers -- pegboardso the lights shine through as if emanating from a hundred windows.

Hegyi and his wife, Kathleen, were admiring his handiwork the first night when the unthinkable happened. A motorist drove by, saw the monument and stopped, made a U-turn, then drove across his lawn and knocked it over.

"I couldn't believe somebody would do that, and why," he fumed. "It was a memorial."

This wasn't some careless driver clipping a mailbox. It wasn't a vandal ripping down Halloween decorations. This felt like a desecration, like someone knocked over a statue of the Virgin Mary just to be mean.

"It's just disrespectful to people's personal property," said Hegyi, who was born in Budapest, Hungary, and immigrated to the United States while his country was behind the Communist Iron Curtain. Damaging the monument insulted his sense of patriotism. "It's disrespectful to America," he said.

He worries this incident goes beyond some moron behind the wheel. People seem to be moving on from something they should never forget.

It took him a few hours to rebuild the memorial. On Monday night, he'll have a candlelight vigil on his front lawn, even if it's just with his wife and three kids. His twin towers will remain standing until midday Tuesday. Next year, he'll try to construct them using glass, like the originals.

"I'm going to put this up as long as I live," he said.

Andrew Skerritt can be reached at 813 909-4602 or toll-free at 1-800-333-7505, ext. 4602. His e-mail address is askerritt@sptimes.com.

[Last modified September 8, 2007, 19:23:27]