campus

4 p.m., Old Dominion Ballroom, Squires Student Center, Virginia Tech



Barbara Keown spent the afternoon helping run the “Remembering through art creation” site in the Old Dominion Ballroom.

Here, she saw beauty created on this day everyone was dreading. She spoke to a woman who came from Ohio to be at Tech today.

The woman’s daughter is a PhD student at the university and the woman was excited to find the art creation room after the morning’s Drillfield ceremony. The woman spent four hours painting a kite. By the time she was finished, it looked like a stained-glass butterfly.

3:40 p.m., Old Dominion Ballroom, Squires Student Center, Virginia Tech

The grass outside the Old Dominion Ballroom has become a graveyard, of sorts.

Those painting stones inside the ballroom, the site of a “remembering through art creation” activity center have placed the painted stones here on the lawn.

“Some of these are really good,” one student onlooker said. Some stones are stained maroon with an orange VT and the words “never forget.”

3 p.m., Tech Softball Park, Virginia Tech

Last April 16, Theresa Walsh had a bullet whiz past her ear in Norris Hall.

The 2007 Tech graduate and former Hokie softball player returned to campus to watch her ex-teammates play Liberty University in a doubleheader.

"It's tough coming back, but it feels good at the same time to have people support you," said Walsh, a Blacksburg resident. "There's certain things as a person, to finish the grieving process, that you have to do. This is one of the things I have to do. I have to come back and be able to watch the team and know that we're moving forward.

"This morning, I was a train wreck. This afternoon, I'm a little bit better."

3:00 p.m.: Tech Softball Park, campus


The mood at the Hokies softball field is much like any other game day - the stands awash in maroon and orange, the loudspeaker blasting songs by Sugarland and Aerosmith, sunny skies prompting girls to bare their shoulders to avoid t-shirt tan lines.


The Hokies are preparing to play the Liberty Flames, who present 32 flowers to their competitors at the start of the game.


Over the loudspeaker blares Metallica's "Enter Sandman," now synonymous with Hokie Sports. Feet start stomping, the stands vibrate, pride swells. This is Hokie Nation, after all.

2:45 p.m., Outside the Haymarket Theatre, Virginia Tech

With 15 minutes until showtime, the line outside the Haymarket Theatre filled the entire lobby of Squires Student Center. This was the buzz among the waiters: "It's full."

A woman's voice, an official, quieted the crowd. She announced she had a list of reserved seats for dancers' families. "Otherwise, we are at capacity and we have no seats."

Meanwhile, students behind a counter were selling hip scarves, velvet sashes with metallic coins that jingle. The money goes toward Reema Samaha's Middle Eastern dance memorial fund. One woman bought an elaborate dangly gold necklace. "I want to help the cause," she said.

2:15 p.m., War Memorial Chapel, Virginia Tech

On the sunny Drillfield outside, students lay on blankets and tossed footballs. Inside the sanctuary, a pianist tickled the keys, producing slow, somber tones on the black baby grand.

Wreaths and lit candles stood in front of the cool, gray walls of the sanctuary stage. A few lone souls sat on the maroon cushioned seats, silent and reflecting. Some stayed just moments and stepped out into the day, quiet as ghosts. Some sat with their thoughts for a long time.

All the while, the piano kept playing.

Submitted by Erinn Hutkin | The Roanoke Times

2 p.m., Drillfield, Virginia Tech

They lay down on the grass of the Drillfield, roughly halfway between the places where two groups of victims laid one year ago in Norris and West Ambler-Johnston halls.

In silence, the 50-some protestors stayed down for three minutes, about the time they said it takes to buy a gun.

Unlike the other vigils and ceremonies held on campus and around the region to mark the one-year anniversary of the Virginia Tech shootings, this one did more than commemorate the dead – it appealed to the living to do something about the ease with which guns are purchased in America.

2 p.m., near Peddrew-Yates Residence Hall, Virginia Tech

Name: Roderick Neal
Age: 42
Hometown: Bluefield, W.Va.
Occupation: Doctoral student in sociology, Virginia Tech

Roderick Neal intended to complete his PhD in sociology as quickly as possible and move on. Neal now considers himself a “proud Hokie” who never anticipated owning so many orange-colored clothes.

Submitted by Duncan Adams | The Roanoke Times

1:47 p.m., near Peddrew-Yates Residence Hall, Virginia Tech


Name: Nick Williams
Age: 18
Hometown: Sterling
Occupation: Virginia Tech freshman (planning to major in mechanical engineering)

Nick Williams said the events of April 16, 2007, when he was a high school senior, did not make him reconsider attending Tech.



Submitted by Duncan Adams | The Roanoke Times

Name: Jonathan Gaines
Age: 25
Hometown: Charlottesville
Occupation: Mechanical engineering doctoral student, Virginia Tech