By Emma Braithwaite, Features Editor
Nov. 23, 2015. It’s been six years since Bri Blumenthal was struck by a car and killed in a tragic accident that took place on Colington Road. Now, the year that Bri would have been celebrating her senior year, the sign placed in her honor at the intersection where the accident occurred has been recreated.
Art teacher Alice Baldwin and gym teacher Chris Mascio collaborated to start this project with their classes. They believed this year would be the best time to update the sign because Bri was part of the Class of 2022.
“Every afternoon I do the crossing guard duty out at the corner of Colington intersection, so I get to see the Bri sign every single day,” Baldwin said. “(Redoing Bri’s sign) was always something that was on the radar, but we never knew when it would be the perfect time to do it. This being her senior year, it just seemed perfect.”
The idea to update the sign stemmed from a discussion between Mascio and his students. They had noticed that the sign was starting to show its age and were wondering if there was something they could do.
“I started the process of asking around and figuring out how we could fix the sign,” Mascio said. “I talked to Ms. Baldwin and we decided we could make it a safety initiative for the school.”
The classes that collaborated on this project contained mostly seniors. Mascio has one class involved in the project and Baldwin has two — her Art III and IV classes. Senior Aubrey Holland is in Mascio’s class and is one of the students who worked to make this new sign become a reality.
“We were put into groups and worked on different parts of the sign,” Holland said. “Some people are working on the design, some people are doing more of the hands-on stuff, but I think it’s mostly the people that were in Bri’s grade that are doing the painting and the decorating.”
This project has brought up a lot of emotions for the seniors involved. Working on the sign has made some of them feel like it was just yesterday when the accident occurred. Bri was riding her bike and crossing from Veterans Drive toward the bike path on the opposite side of Colington when a driver failed to stop for the red light and struck Bri. She succumbed to her injuries four days later, on Thanksgiving.
“We haven’t really addressed her in a long time, I feel like, until the sign,” Holland said. “So now it’s almost like we are back in the sixth grade when all that happened because that’s when the sign and everything was made for her.”
Bri’s father, Scotty Blumenthal, was touched when he heard that students in Bri’s grade wanted to recreate the sign.
“It led into just how much she was loved and how much everybody appreciated her for who she was,” Blumenthal said. “The whole thing has been about bringing the community together, and she would’ve loved that.”
The new sign is designed to look very similar to the original with only a few minor changes.
“We wanted to do an ode to the old sign, so we took a trip out to look at where it is right now and just take in what it says on it and also the colors and imagery. So it has the heart, it has the flowers and it says ‘We Love You Bri,’ ” Baldwin said. “The one thing we are switching up is the shape, so it’s more of a square this time instead of a rectangle.”
The back of the new sign also has a quote written on it. This quote was given to Mascio by Bri’s father.
“I’m friends with Scotty, so I called him and he gave me some quotes for the back of it,” Mascio said. “The quotes that we put on the back explain that even after death, she will not be forgotten.”
The new sign was placed at the Colington Road and Veterans Drive intersection Nov. 23, which was the day the accident occurred six years ago. Students working on the project worked hard to have the sign done by that date.
“The incident happened right before we left for Thanksgiving break and then she passed right at Thanksgiving, so we were hoping for it to be put up right at that timing,” Baldwin said.
Scotty, who put up the new sign with the students who helped make it, hopes the memorial will remind the community of who Bri truly was.
“She was such a spirit of the Outer Banks,” Blumenthal said. “She moved here when she was 4 and just absolutely fell in love with the place. She felt at home.”
Now, the new sign placed in Bri’s memory will allow people to honor and remember her spirit for years to come.
“The sign is a great way to remember her,” senior Kaylan Davis said. “Even when our class leaves, the other classes will be able to see it and remember her.”
Junior Emma Braithwaite can be reached at 23braithwaiteem06@daretolearn.org.
