Walk through Lake Park in Des Plaines, Illinois, on a quiet afternoon and you'll eventually find a curved wall of reddish-brown brick. It’s not flashy. It doesn't scream for your attention from the road. But for the families of the 273 people who died on May 25, 1979, this simple structure is everything. For decades, there was nothing. No plaque. No names. Just a scarred field near an airport and a lot of painful memories that people seemingly wanted to move past. The American Airlines Flight 191 memorial exists today only because a group of sixth graders and their teacher decided that "nothing" wasn't an acceptable answer for the worst non-terrorist aviation accident in U.S. history.
It’s heavy stuff. Honestly, it’s a bit weird how long it took. When Flight 191 lost its left engine on takeoff from O'Hare, it wasn't just a local tragedy; it changed how we fly. The DC-10, once a flagship of the skies, had its reputation permanently dented that day. Yet, for over thirty years, the site of the crash—just northwest of the intersection of Touhy Avenue and Mt. Prospect Road—remained an unmarked patch of land.
The long silence after the 191 tragedy
Why did it take until 2011 to get a formal American Airlines Flight 191 memorial? You'd think a disaster of this magnitude would have a monument within a year or two. It’s complicated. Part of it was the sheer trauma. The crash was horrific. 258 passengers, 13 crew members, and two people on the ground were gone in an instant. The debris field was a nightmare. For the city of Chicago and the airline, there was a sense of wanting to heal by looking forward rather than backward. But you can't just "look forward" when your brother, mother, or best friend vanished into a fireball 31 seconds after lifting off the runway.
For years, the "unofficial" memorial was just the grass. Families would visit the site, which sits near a mobile home park and an old hangar, and just... stand there. There was no place to put flowers that wouldn't blow away. No wall to touch. It felt like the world had forgotten.
Then came the kids from Decatur Classical School. In 2009, a class of sixth graders led by teacher Kim Jockl—who lost both her parents, Bill and Corrine Borchers, on that flight—started a project. They didn't just write essays. They lobbied. They pushed. They realized that the greatest aviation disaster on American soil (outside of 9/11) deserved a name. They were the ones who finally broke the bureaucratic silence that had lasted three decades.
Designing the American Airlines Flight 191 memorial
When you finally visit the wall, you'll notice it’s made of about 5,000 bricks. It’s two feet high. Humble. The design was meant to be accessible, something you could sit on and reflect. Each of the 273 names is etched into the stone.
The location in Lake Park was a strategic choice. It’s about two miles from the actual crash site. Why not at the site itself? Well, the crash happened in what is now a restricted drainage area and near private property. Lake Park offered a space where people could actually congregate without hearing the roar of jet engines quite so loudly, though you can still see the planes climbing out of O'Hare in the distance. It’s a bittersweet view. You’re looking at the same flight path 191 was supposed to take toward Los Angeles.
The construction cost about $100,000. Most of that came from American Airlines, the Chicago Department of Aviation, and private donations. It’s sort of wild that it took a class of 12-year-olds to get these massive entities to cut a check, but that’s often how these things go. The wall was dedicated on a cold, windy day in October 2011. Hundreds of people showed up. People who hadn't seen each other since the funerals in 1979 were suddenly hugging strangers because they recognized the names on the wall.
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The names you'll see
It’s not just a list of victims; it’s a snapshot of 1979. You’ll see the names of:
- Itzhak Bentov, a famous biomedical inventor and author.
- Leonard Stogel, a music manager who had previously lost his parents in another plane crash (the 1962 American Airlines Flight 1).
- Multiple members of the Corabi family.
- The crew, led by Captain Walter Lux, who had thousands of hours of experience and did everything humanly possible to save the plane in those final 31 seconds.
What really happened that day?
To understand the weight of the American Airlines Flight 191 memorial, you have to understand the sheer technical failure that led to it. This wasn't pilot error. It wasn't "an act of God." It was a maintenance shortcut.
During a previous service, mechanics at an American Airlines facility in Tulsa had used a forklift to remove the engine and its pylon (the part that attaches the engine to the wing) as a single unit to save time. The manufacturer, McDonnell Douglas, didn't recommend this. The forklift wasn't precise enough. It caused a tiny, invisible crack in the pylon.
On May 25, as the plane hit takeoff speed, that crack finally gave way. The entire left engine ripped off, flipped over the top of the wing, and severed the hydraulic lines. The pilots didn't know the engine was gone—they just knew they lost power. Because the hydraulic lines were cut, the slats on the left wing retracted. The left wing stalled, the plane rolled 112 degrees to the left, and it dived into the ground.
The NTSB report changed everything. It forced airlines to stop using the forklift shortcut. It changed how pylons were inspected. It basically saved countless lives in the long run, but that’s small comfort to the people whose names are now on a brick wall in Des Plaines.
Visiting the site today
If you’re planning to pay your respects, here is what you need to know. Lake Park is located at 2200 Lee Street in Des Plaines. The memorial is on the north side of the park. It’s open from dawn to dusk.
Don't expect a giant museum or a gift shop. It’s a quiet place. You’ll see people leaving small stones on top of the wall—a Jewish tradition of remembrance—or sticking flowers into the crevices between the bricks. It’s a place of heavy silence right in the middle of a busy suburb.
Kinda makes you think about how we handle grief as a society. We're great at the immediate aftermath, the news cycles, and the flags at half-mast. We’re not so great at the long-term "remembering" part. That 32-year gap between the crash and the memorial is a testament to that. But the fact that the wall exists now proves that it's never too late to do the right thing.
Practical Steps for Visitors and Researchers
- Check the weather: Lake Park is right by the water and very exposed. It gets incredibly windy. If you're going in winter, dress like you're heading to the tundra.
- Respect the neighborhood: The memorial is near a residential area. Keep noise levels down. Most people visiting are there for personal, often painful, reasons.
- Read the NTSB report first: If you're a history or aviation buff, read the official NTSB report on Flight 191 before you go. It makes the names on the wall feel much more real when you understand the mechanical nightmare they were caught in.
- Support the maintenance: The memorial is maintained through the Des Plaines Park District. They occasionally accept donations for the upkeep of the landscaping and the brickwork.
The American Airlines Flight 191 memorial isn't just a monument to a crash. It's a reminder that every safety regulation in aviation is written in blood. Every time you fly today, the lessons learned from the tragedy of 191 are keeping you in the air. That wall in Des Plaines is where we go to say thank you to the people who paid the price for those lessons. It took too long to build, but now that it's there, it's not going anywhere.
For those looking to dive deeper into the genealogy or specific stories of the victims, the Chicago Tribune archives from May and June 1979 provide the most granular look at the lives lost. Many local libraries in the Des Plaines and Rosemont area also keep "memory books" compiled by the families over the years. Taking the time to read a few of those stories before visiting the wall transforms the experience from a simple tourist stop into a profound act of witness.
Next Steps:
If you are planning a visit, start at the Des Plaines Park District website to check for any scheduled memorial events, which typically occur every May 25th. For those unable to visit in person, the "Flight 191 Memorial" Facebook group, run by survivors and family members, is the most active community for sharing photos and tributes.