Wall of Memories honors virus victims
Clear Lake couple develop nonprofit, website to memorialize the hundreds of thousands of people killed by COVID-19
In an effort to drawattention to and humanize Americans who have lost their lives to the coronavirus pandemic, a Clear Lake couple has developed the COVID-19 Wall of Memories, a nonprofit organization that includes an interactive website.
Mohammed Nasrullah and his wife, Ruth, began thinking of the project last spring when the pandemic started to sweep across the country. However, when the national death toll reached 100,000, they decided to find a way to honor the dead.
“I felt the need to act,” Mohammad Nasrullah said. “I kept thinking that (in the news) they just kept talking about the number of people who had died, but that number represented people in our community, in our hospitals and in our schools, and I thought we needed to put a face to those numbers.”
From this desire sprang the idea to post victims’ faces and stories to the Nasrullahs’ online site.
The faces on the virtualwall include well-known figures — such as “Gilligan’s Island” star Dawn Wells, who died Dec. 30 of causes related to COVID-19 — and those less well-known.
Nasrullah, a full-time community volunteer and board member of the Multicultural Center in Webster, said the idea for the website’s design and virtual wall came from the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C.
“I wanted it to be just like that, but virtual, where you can be scrolling and see the victims who have been hit by this terrible disease,” he said.
The virtual wall now honors about 600 virus victims. Visitors can scroll through photos of the victims and read their stories by clicking on the pictures. The Nasrullahs said the victims’ profiles collected so far have been culled by volunteers who repost online obituaries.
“We want to honor them, remember them and share their story,” Nasrullah said.
The site officially launched Jan. 4. Ruth Nasrullah, who is a journalist, said she hoped that as people become more aware of it, they will upload photos and stories of their loved ones who have died of COVID-19.
“Everyone ( who has died of COVID-19) deserves a space on the wall,” she said. “That is our goal.”
The couple said people can contribute information about relatives or friends who have died from the virus to the site by accessing its “Share your loved one’s story” link at the top of the home page. The site’s database can hold up to 500,000 obituaries. The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus has exceeded 360,000.
In addition to the memorial part of the site, the COVID-19Wall of Memories includes information to educate readers about the virus, available vaccines, testing sites and contact tracing through a section called “Just the Facts.”
Ruth Nasrullah said each section, along with the virtual wall and death toll counts from each state, are important to her and her husband’s overall mission.
“Maybe our website can change (theminds of people) that have this idea that (this disease) is a hoax or just like the flu,” she said.
Articles on the site include first-person accounts from those who have survived a bout with the virus, including Houston City Councilwoman Letitia Plummer and Texas Monthly contributor Kathryn Jones.
Ruth Nasrullah recruited volunteer journalists to write about the impact of COVID-19 on various industries and the challenges accessing health care in rural areas and to pen opinion pieces and sharemedical news. She also hopes to tackle how the virus has impacted the LGBTQ community as well as other topics.
“I’m trying to cover angles that I haven’t heard a lot about,” she said. “We want to inform and move people.”
Mohammed Nasrullah says looking at the faces has an impact on him.
“When I see the faces, it’s just so sad and I cannot take it, so I shut down my laptop,” he said, but added, “I know we haven’t even scratched the surface of victims, butwewant to see everyone on the Wall of Memories.”