our twentieth century mural

Muralist

David McDonald

Date Completed

2000

Location

203 West C Street on the Napa Auto Parts building

History

Our Twentieth Century

When artist David McDonald presented his idea for this mural, located on C Street on the side of the Napa Auto Parts building, the members of the Silverton Mural Society were eager to see it funded. Created between 2000 and 2001, Our Twentieth Century was inspired by the artist’s love of history and depicts numerous important events and individuals that helped shape this great nation over the previous century. Along with the art work, this mural includes twenty-six famous quotations that the artist feels helps to characterize this period of history.

The twenty-six quotes are listed here:

  • Your huddled masses yearning to be free…  –  Inscription on the Statue of Liberty
  • They can have any color they want, as long as it’s black – Henry Ford concerning his Model-T
  • We won’t come back till it’s over, over there… – Lyrics from George M. Cohen marching song
  •  The war to end all wars – A hopeful sentiment after World War I
  • How you gonna keep ‘em down on the farm…? – Tune lyric from World War I
  • Don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing… – Count Basie jazz lyrics
  • When you wish upon a star – Lyric from the movie Pinocchio
  • The only thing we have to fear is fear itself… – Franklin Roosevelt’s 1933 speech
  • A date which will live in infamy… – Part of F.D.R.’s 1941 declaration of war
  • Regret to inform you – Salutation on official correspondence sent to military families
  • Nuts!… – General Anthony McAuliffe’s response when the Germans demanded his surrender
  • I am become death, shatterer of worlds – Robert Oppenheimer after witnessing the detonation of the first A-bomb
  • Don’t sit under the apple tree… – Popular WWII song lyric
  • Vita Meata Vegimin – From the I Love Lucy TV show
  • Are you now or have you ever been – Common question during the McCarthy era
  • AWOP bop aloobop ALOP BAM boom – Little Richard song lyric
  • Ask not what your country can do for you… – John F. Kennedy inauguration speech
  • We will bury you… – Soviet leader Nikita Krushev
  • I have a dream… – Martin Luther King, 1963
  • And it’s one, two, three, what are we fighting for…? – Viet Nam anti-war lyric
  • One small step for man… – Neil Armstrong on the moon
  • Where have all the flowers gone…? – Folk song from the early 1960s
  • And in the end the love you take is equal to the love you give… – Beatles lyric
  • Perestroika… – Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev’s reform policy
  • May the force be with you… – Star Wars, 1977
  • America is great collective act of imagination whose making never ends – Art critic Robert Hughes

MURAL TOURS

The Silverton Mural Society offers a variety of Tours that showcase the Murals and History of Silverton. Click on one of the links below to see more information.

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Silverton Mural Society
214 S Water Street
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Silverton Or. 97381

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