The tragic events of September 11 touched every American, creating a desire by many to do something to contribute to the healing.
For Bob Hedin, founder of the Red Dirt Shirt Co. and an engineer at the U.S. Navy’s Pacific Missile Range Facility, it was a double impact.
Several of his Navy co-workers were in the Pentagon annex when the plane hit. They heard the explosion and felt the impact, but were safe.
Back on Kaua’i, Hedin remembered the devastation of Hurricane ‘Iniki that ravaged the island on Sept. 11, 1992, exactly nine years before the terrorist attacks on Washington, D.C. and New York City, and the impact the hurricane had on Kaua’i’s people and economy.
Although insignificant compared to the recent national and international tragedy, ‘Iniki did blow away Hedin’s original T-shirt factory. All his white shirts were stained with Kaua’i’s now-famous red dirt.
Rather than go out of business, Hedin decided to work with nature instead of against it, and started dyeing red-dirt shirts.
On September 11 this year, the nation and world witnessed more heartbreaking destruction, this time manmade. Watching fireman unfurl the American flag on the side of the damaged Pentagon, Hedin immediately decided to commemorate this second 911 disaster with a special shirt expressing the love of “A Nation United,” and portraying the output of aloha spirit from America’s 50th state to all.
Hedin also created a poster of renewal depicting the ghostly World Trade Center towers looking like an erupting volcano. The first sign of life after a volcanic eruption is the ‘Ohi’a plant with its beautiful red lehua blossoms, which are portrayed as springing from the destruction and rubble, he said of the poster design.
He believes the nation and the economy of the nation and islands can likewise recover through love and understanding and the aloha and support of Hawai’i’s people.
The T-shirts, available at the Paradise Sportswear’s locations including the Red Dirt Shirt Company factory outlet at Port Allen, were unveiled last week.
Each one of the shirts with the American flag surrounded by a lei of yellow plumerias makes the statement, “A Nation United.”
Profits from sales of the shirts will go to the United Way September 11th fund, and to the Salvation Army Christmas fund for the children of Hawai’i’s many unemployed.
For more information, please call 335-5670.
