I went to Montreal, Canada where the Pam Schwartz, director of the Orange County History Center gave a talk about preserving history after the Pulse Nightclub shooting tragedy where 49 people were murdered in a mass shooting.
The Pulse Nightclub and the Doctor Phillips Center for the Performing Arts became locations where people went to leave memorial items and flowers.
Rather than allow all those items end up in landfills, the Orange County History Center mobilized to collect the memorial items. They were categorized organized and are now at the History Center’s offsite warehouse. Each year after the tragedy the mounted memorial exhibits to honor those who were lost.
I went to several of the History Centers collection days and it was certainly not easy work. Collecting had to be done in the hottest months of the summer. The once beautiful flowers were dead and had a highly pungent smell. The director once told me that she would be happy if she never saw a bouquet of flowers ever again. It is very possible that breathing all that decaying matter affected the lungs of History Center staff.
Some Orlando citizens did not appreciate the work the History Center was doing. To them the collection process looked like grave robbing. There were several people who were combative as the staff did there work on site. The same people would be thankful when they saw how much thought and love went into the memorial exhibits.