First memorial to Flight 629 bombing, one of Colorado’s deadliest mass murders, unveiled in Denver

There is a distinct before and after the night of Nov. 1, 1955, when a United Airlines flight exploded over a sugar beet field near Longmont, killing all 44 people on board in one of the deadliest mass murders in Colorado history.

There is before Susan Morgan lost her parents, Stewart and Anne, at 12 years old because a Denver man, Jack Gilbert Graham, put a homemade bomb in his mother’s suitcase.

Graham bought a life insurance policy as he escorted his mother, Daisie King, to the gate for United Airlines Flight 629 at Stapleton Airport. She unknowingly carried 25 sticks of dynamite, timed to explode after the Portland, Oregon-bound flight took off.

There is before Dave Benedict learned, at 3 years old, that he would never meet his grandparents, James and Sarah Dorey, because they were killed when a bomb exploded on their flight to visit him for the first time.

Now 70 years after the bombing of Flight 629, families of the 44 victims gathered at the former Stapleton control tower for the unveiling of Colorado’s first memorial to the tragedy.

“Today’s commemoration is not just about what happened in 1955, it’s about who we became because of it,” FBI Special Agent in Charge Mark Michalek told hundreds of people gathered at the FlyteCo Tower on Saturday morning.

It was also about healing, Benedict said. He thought this weekend would include a dinner, maybe, and was at a loss for words to describe what the ceremonies and events organized by the Denver Police Museum and dozens of other organizations and volunteers meant to him.

“The ability to listen to other people’s stories and to hear what carrying 70 years of unspoken pain has been like… we’re hearing that over and over again,” he said. “Very few of the victims’ children or spouses had any context in which to talk about this, to work through it or process it, so that’s happening now.”

In the decades after losing her parents, Morgan came to realize she also had lost her life as she knew it and who she thought she would become, she said.

But even knowing the darkness that became part of her life, Morgan told the crowd of families, first responders, investigators and court officials, she cannot wish that it never happened. That she had never created her “second family,” or viewed the world with clear eyes.

“I’m among a large group of people whose lives have been scarred by the same tragedy as mine,” Morgan said. “That sense of something shared is a remarkable thing.”

It’s not clear why it took so long to create a memorial to the bombing, although some officials on Saturday speculated the scattered nature of the victims’ families – only one, Daisie King, was from Colorado – played a part.

But each one had a story, former Denver Police Department Deputy Chief William Nagle told the crowd. Nagle read out name after name, describing the life behind each one.

Capt. Lee Hall, a World War II veteran who was planning to retire early. He left behind a wife and four children.

Helen Fitzpatrick, who was flying with her 13-month-old son, James, so he could meet his father and namesake while he was deployed in Japan.

They were restaurant owners, general contractors, car salesmen. Folks taking the first airplane trip of their lives.

“What is important now is that we tell the story of each of these 44 lives,” Denver Mayor Mike Johnston told the crowd.

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