Museum Visitors Feel Connection to D.C. Shooting

Gan Matthews, NEWS 9

OKLAHOMA CITY -- Visitors to the Science Museum Oklahoma expressed a deeper connection to a deadly Washington, D.C. shooting after seeing a visiting Holocaust Memorial Exhibit.

Thanks to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, Oklahomans can go to the Science Museum Oklahoma and see an exhibit that drives home the evil nature of anti-Semitism in general and Naziism in particular.

The exhibit, called "Deadly Medicine," depicts the sterilization, eugenics and euthanasia of Nazi Germany in order to create a master race. The display focuses on events that occurred sixty to seventy years ago, but many visitors on Thursday connected their visit to Wednesday's shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.

"We're Christian people and it's just hard for us to understand that a man can carry this much hate around with him," said Bill Campbell, a visitor from Blanchard. "He didn't particularly care who he shot. He was just mad and angry."

The Director of the Jewish Federation of Greater Oklahoma City said the shooting should be a wake up call.

"It's frightening and alarming and I think...all of us need to be more vigilant," said Edie Roodman, of Jewish Federation of Greater Oklahoma City.

The Holocaust exhibit at the Science Museum Oklahoma runs through July 5, 2009.