‘It hurt to the core': Fairhope woman reunited with what's left of husband's memorial bench from pier renovations
FAIRHOPE, Ala. (WKRG) — Every month after her husband passed in 2010, Brenda Till would take a walk down the Fairhope Pier to visit her husband's memorial bench that she purchased nearly 13 years ago.
'It was a memorial marker. It was a place for us to go and visit with him,' Till said. 'I would come at night and talk to him. It was our little time, our space.'
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But everything changed one evening in the past few months when she noticed the bench was gone.
'When I got out to Frank's bench, well where it should have been, it was heartbreaking,' Till said. 'It really was. I can't even tell you what I felt that night.'
All of the memorial benches on the pier were removed during renovations and repairs to the Municipal Park as a part of the city's Working Waterfront Project that began in August 2024.
The original memorial benches along the pier were replaced with ones made of a composite, durable material. City officials said they plan to add memorial plaques to the benches soon. The old benches were made of wood and were beginning to tarnish from the outdoor elements.
'It's not the bench. It's the sentiment behind the boards,' Till said. 'My first cousin's bench was the first bench on the left as you go in. The next bench on the right was a good friend of ours, and he used to go fishing with Frank. The one up from that, we knew their family.'
'No one ever said, 'And we're throwing away your benches.' That's what hurt me more than anything,' she added.
In a January council meeting, the city declared the benches as surplus, so they could return the engraved boards to the families who originally purchased the bench. City property is not allowed to be given away without going through the proper channels first such as marking the material as surplus when it is no longer needed for public for municipal purposes.
When the city decided to surplus the boards, there were two disposal options for family members who purchased the benches: to dispose of them via landfill, or the engraved bench boards were available to family or person who donated the bench according to the council meeting notes.
Now, families can collect what's left of those benches.
Till said she was eager to discover her loved one's engraved boards were safe and couldn't wait to pick them up — until the city informed her the pickup address was the city landfill.
'I called my kids, and I said, 'I don't know if I can do this. I don't know if I can go to the dump and get Frank,'' Till said. 'It hurt to the core, it really did. But at least we got the boards back.'
At the end of the day, Till said she was just happy she was able to bring this piece of her husband's memory home.
'The relief was just unreal,' Till said. 'I didn't want to get emotional, but it meant a lot to us, to my whole family.'
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And she already has big plans for what she wants to do with her husband's wooden memorial boards.
'My sons are going to make me another bench with the boards, and we'll sit it out by the house,' Till said. 'So we'll have Frank at home still, and I'm thankful for that.'
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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Federal buildings are among the hardest hit, and there was no sign of the National Guard or Marines protecting those facilities Tuesday. On North Los Angeles Street, contractors were paying particular attention to the asphalt where five Waymo self-driving electric vehicles were burned by protesters, releasing rare Earth materials that can be hazardous. Around the corner, painter's apprentice Tim Brevard, 53, covered up graffiti on a wall with grey paint shot from a sprayer. Under normal circumstances, Brevard's team removes gang graffiti from the same area daily. Now it is political graffiti. City policy calls for removing it within 72 hours of being reported, and the city spends about $14 million annually on graffiti removal, according to its annual budget. 'Down here it's tough because there's fresh graffiti every day,' Brevard said as he paused to wipe sweat from his face with a gloved hand. 'There's always gang graffiti. Every day we do this.' The protests in Los Angeles County began as a reaction to a handful of immigration raids, including one outside a Home Depot and another at a clothing manufacturer in the city's garment district. The raids and subsequent outrage came as the Trump administration stepped up its detention and deportation of immigrants including at workplaces, traffic stops and routine legal check-ins. Protests against these moves have increased, too. While most have remained peaceful, the Department of Homeland Security reported a more than 400% surge in assaults on agents. After small protests against immigration raids in Los Angeles on June 6, Trump took several swift actions, calling in the 4,000 California National Guard troops and 700 Marines, drawing ire – and at least one lawsuit – from California officials who accuse the president of stoking tension and escalating unrest. Trump has stood by his actions, saying the deployments were necessary to contain what he described as "violent, instigated riots." About 150 people have been arrested at the protests, which have included flare-ups of unruly clashes, vandalism and looting, but have remained limited to a few blocks in the city's downtown area. As authorities brace for another day of protests and Los Angelenos ready themselves for the increased military presence, read more about how the protests began. Trump said he would consider invoking the Insurrection Act, which would give him more leeway to use the military for domestic purposes as he deploys troops to Los Angeles in response to violent protests. "If there's an insurrection, I would certainly invoke it,' Trump said Tuesday during an event in the White House. 'We'll see. But I can tell you, last night was terrible. The night before that was terrible." 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'Good to know we're skipping the arrest and going straight for the 1700s style forms of punishment. A fitting threat given the (Republicans) want to bring our country back to the 18th Century.' − Sarah D. Wire Most of the unrest is taking place across a few square miles in a mostly commercial area downtown. The city is sprawled across hundreds of square miles and the county covers thousands of square miles. The vast majority of the metropolitan area has been quiet, with people able to continue their daily routines. Trump has insisted that he had no choice but to increase the level of force in response to growing unrest over his immigration crackdown. CA Gov. Newsom fired back at Trump, border czar Homan California Governor Gavin Newsom fired back after President Trump hinted border czar Homan should arrest him if he interfered in ICE raids. 700 Marines heading to LA for riot assistance; Newsom calls move 'deranged fantasy' of Trump Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told a House committee Tuesday the United States was entering a new phase in which the National Guard would "become a critical component of how we secure that homeland." "The National Guard is a huge component of how we see the future," he told the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense. Bryn MacDonnell, a special assistant to the secretary of defense, said the Pentagon is spending $134 million of deploying 4,000 National Guard troops and 700 Marines. Funding is coming from operations and maintenance accounts, he said. − Mayes-Osterman, Cybele Newsom criticized Trump on X Tuesday after Stephen Miller, Trump's deputy chief of staff for policy, blasted the governor on the same social media site hours earlier. Miller wrote that "when the rioters swarmed, you handed over your streets, willingly. You still refuse to arrest and prosecute the arsonists, seditionists and insurrectionists." Newsom made reference to Trump's decision to pardon or commute the sentences of hundreds of people in connection with the assault on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. "The only people defending insurrectionists are you and @realDonaldTrump," Newsom wrote. "Or, are we pretending like you didn't pardon 1500 of them?" Several national civil rights groups described the Trump administration's National Guard deployment as an overreach of power that was 'deeply disturbing" and 'reckless." "It is not lost on us that no such show of force was deployed in advance of the January 6 insurrection at our nation's capital despite the clear threat to democracy. The contrast is alarming," leaders wrote in a statement released Monday night. 'Peaceful protesters in Los Angeles are met with military presence, while violent actors in Washington, D.C. were allowed to breach the heart of our government with little resistance. This inconsistency amplifies questions about how power is used and against whom." The right to protest the Trump administration's "unjust policies targeting Black and Brown communities must be protected," they wrote. The groups include the NAACP, the National Urban League, the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation, the National Action Network, the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the Leadership Conference, the National Council of Negro Women and the Legal Defense Fund. Separately, Judith LeBlanc, executive director of Native Organizers Alliance Action Fund, called the administration's decision to call in the National Guard and the Marines 'an act of violence meant to silence organizers who are taking a righteous stand against the illegal and brutal ICE raids happening everyday.' − Deborah Barfield Berry Multiple members of the media have reported being caught in the crossfire or targeted by authorities using tear gas or rubber bullets. The incidents included Australian journalist Lauren Tomasi, who was hit in the leg by a rubber bullet on camera in a video that shows an officer appearing to aim at her. A New York Post photographer, Toby Canham, also said he was shot in the forehead with a nonlethal round. British freelance photographer Nick Stern told the BBC he underwent emergency surgery after he was hit in the leg by a plastic bullet. The Committee to Protect Journalists has sounded the alarm over the incidents, warning against the intimidation of journalists. 'Any attempt to discourage or silence media coverage by intimidating or injuring journalists should not be tolerated,' Katherine Jacobsen, program coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists in the U.S., Canada and the Caribbean, said in a statement. 'It is incumbent upon authorities to respect the media's role of documenting issues of public interest.' National Press Club President Mike Balsamo warned that law enforcement "cannot pick and choose when the First Amendment applies. Journalists in Los Angeles were not caught in the crossfire — they were targeted. " -Jeanine Santucci Multiple journalists injured by police nonlethal rounds while covering LA protests Police briefly detained CNN correspondent Jason Carroll while on air Monday night during the network's coverage of the protests. CNN was covering the protests live when in-studio anchors briefly lost contact with Carroll, who could be seen being led away from the protests by LAPD officers with his hands behind his back. Carroll returned to the mic, informing the anchors: "I am being detained." An officer then can be heard telling Carroll: "We're letting you go. You can't come back. If you come back, you will be arrested." CNN issued a statement saying "we are pleased the situation resolved quickly once the reporting team presented law enforcement with their CNN credentials. CNN will continue to report out the news unfolding in Los Angeles." Read more here. − Taijuan Moorman On Monday, California sued the Trump administration, alleging that the president's deployment of Guard troops was unnecessary and unlawful. Newsom later indicated that he will take similar action to prevent the Marines from being deployed, describing the order as a "blatant abuse of power." "It makes me feel like our city is actually a test case," Bass said at a news conference. "A test case for what happens when the federal government moves in and takes the authority away from the state or away from local government." 'I hate it': LA residents who surveyed vandalism fear more violence in future protests Some day laborers and other community members in Los Angeles County are warily watching federal troops, bracing for more raids and trying to look to the future while looking out for each other. Some are still searching for detained family members. Some say they've seen worse. Jose Luis Valencia, 54, is an undocumented immigrant who was born in the Tepito neighborhood of Mexico City. This week he was looking for work outside a Home Depot in Los Angeles County. "We're a little nervous, but we're here looking for work to survive," Valencia told USA TODAY. "We need money to put food on the table and support our family." Read more here. − Pamela Avila and Trevor Hughes The California governor, in a post to social media blasting Trump's decision to send the military members to California, said Marines are 'not political pawns." Newsom said Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was 'illegally' deploying the Marines and argued it was a stunt so Trump could have a 'talking point' at a planned parade in Washington on Saturday to celebrate the 250th birthday of the Army, also the day of Trump's 79th birthday. "The Courts and Congress must act. Checks and balances are crumbling," Newsom added. -Jeanine Santucci Officials at the Los Angeles Police Department said Monday that despite violent demonstrations, local police can handle whatever protesters throw at them and that federal help is unnecessary and could become a hindrance. 'The possible arrival of federal military forces in Los Angeles - absent clear coordination - presents a significant logistical and operational challenge for those of us charged with safeguarding this city,' Police Chief Jim McDonnell said in a statement. 'The Los Angeles Police Department, alongside our mutual aid partners, have decades of experience managing large-scale public demonstrations, and we remain confident in our ability to do so professionally and effectively.' LAPD said officers have fired over 600 non-lethal bullets and used tear gas on the "hostile crowd." Among those hit was an Australian journalist covering the protests. At least five officers received minor injuries, according to police. Five police horses also 'were targeted and sustained minor injuries," police said. Read more here. The protests began Friday after U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement sweeps near Los Angeles resulted in more than 40 arrests. The protests had largely been peaceful but flared up when heavily armed, masked agents raided Los Angeles businesses. Tricia McLaughlin, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, defended the raids and said those arrested by ICE included a Vietnamese man convicted of second-degree murder, an Ecuadoran man convicted of possession of five kilograms of cocaine, and a Filipino man convicted of sexual offenses. On Monday, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said local immigrant rights groups had confirmed at least five ICE raids in the Los Angeles region. The mayor said officials were still working to compile more information on the raids but noted that in some cases, ICE targeted day laborers and detained people who appeared for scheduled immigration appointments. "As you know, ICE does not tell anybody where they're going to go or when they're going to be there," Bass said at the Monday news conference. Protests also sprang up in at least nine other cities across the U.S. on Monday, including New York, Philadelphia, and San Francisco, according to Reuters. Protests in Los Angeles were relatively peaceful when they began on Friday, but escalated into scenes of chaos, with electric vehicles lit aflame, large clouds of tear gas and clashes between law enforcement and demonstrators. Trump has backed his move to send in troops, calling the protests 'violent, insurrectionist mobs' and 'lawless riots.' But Newsom said it was Trump who 'instigated violence.' Experts say while there are legal definitions for a riot, the term has become increasingly politicized and encapsulates a wide variety of incidents. In most states including California, the key determinator lies in whether multiple people are involved and whether they are committing acts of violence, Brian Higgins, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, said. "One person is not a riot and neither is a group that is nonviolent," he said. "They can even be breaking the law, like refusing to disperse. It's when you add in the factor of violence that it becomes a riot." There are some gray areas, he said. Experts also said that while violence is a defining factor in a riot, such violence could be incited by law enforcement. Read more. Contributing: Jeanine Santucci and Phaedra Trethan, USA TODAY; Reuters
