Note to Newseum: Don't make the "death car" mistake

I am a fan of The Newseum, a museum of the news business that operated in the late 1990s in Arlington, Virginia and will soon open its gala new site on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. Its CEO, Charles Overby, is a nice man who has been generous to me.

But if what I have heard is true, the Newseum is about to make a mistake. It involves the Don Bolles "death car."

Don Bolles was a renowned reporter for the Arizona Republic who was murdered 30 years ago. While he was investigating local mob activity, a bomb was placed in his car. He lived for 11 days after the explosion, and then died. More about his career and his death is here.

The Newseum intends to honor Don Bolles, and it should. This is one more reminder that reporting can be dangerous, and that many people who enter journalism perform noble work at great personal risk. According to a friend of mine in the Bolles family, the relatives of Don Bolles are honored and touched that his work and death would be remembered in this way.

But as part of the display, the Newseum plans to feature the "death car" -- the vehicle in which Don Bolles suffered his mortal wounds. The family wishes this car would not be shown, and -- according to my friend -- has asked the Newseum not to display it, so far to no avail.

Three disclaimers of my own here: The first concerns my friend, Gary Bolles, who is Don Bolles's nephew (and the son of Richard Bolles, author of the famous What Color is your Parachute?). He has also been a partner of mine in several Davos-style conferences in the high-tech world, for which he has been the producer and I have been the emcee.

Second: I can imagine similarly-aggrieved families coming to a decision other than the one the Bolles family has. For example, Daniel Pearl's widow, Mariane, has seemed to encourage rather than discourage discussion and display of some of the most gruesome aspects of his murder, as a reminder of the evil forces who killed him. Some Holocaust survivors have felt the same way. It is possible to imagine that the relatives of Don Bolles would welcome the car's display, as part of the commemoration of his life and death. But as it happens, they do not. They feel it crosses the line between historical remembrance and macabre voyeurism.

Third: I can imagine circumstances in which a family's wishes might be overruled. If the event being described were of such historic importance that it overshadowed mere personal sentiment. Artifacts from the Lincoln or Kennedy assassinations might meet this test, for instance. But it is no diminution of Don Bolles to say that this is not such a case.

In the circumstances, the wishes of the Bolles family should be given extra weight. They clearly do not want the instrument of their brother's/uncle's/father's murder to be on display, for casual gawking. I hope that on reflection, the Newseum will see that it is not really serving its own interests, or those of journalism, by exploiting the most sensational aspects of a brave man's death.

(I have written to Charles Overby about this topic, in hopes of learning that this concern is misplaced. Having not heard back from him or via the Newseum's "contact" or "info" sites in several weeks, I've posted this note.)