COLUMBIA, S.C. — Two Midlands women, both beloved educators, are among those lost to COVID being honored in a unique piece of art more than 2,400 miles away on the West Coast.
Dennis Bannister lost both his wife and daughter to COVID-19 in 2020, both passing within just weeks of each other.
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In January, Bannister he flew across the country to visit a memorial commemorating his family.
Shirley Bannister, the love of his life, was a nursing instructor at Midlands Technical College (MTC). She received her LPN at Midlands Technical College at the age of 19 and then worked for 30 years in gerontology before leading MTC's nursing department for seven years.
The couple was married for 30 years.
Weeks before Shirley Bannister passed away, the couple lost their daughter Demetria, a third-grade teacher at Windsor Elementary School in Richland School District Two, to COVID. She was just 28-years-old.
"Intelligent, kind-hearted, thoughtful, loving, smiling, high-spirited, the life of the party, incredible ... anything positive, that's what she was," a cousin said about Demetria back in 2020.
“Our hearts are broken forever," said family member Dennis Bell at a service held for both mother and daughter at Bible Way Church of Atlas Road. "Nothing is the same now and we doubt it ever will be."
More than a year after Shirley and Demetria passed away, they are being remembered along with thousands of others, their names written on clay shards in Laguna Beach, California.
Dennis Bannister flew to the West Coast to visit artist Robin Lee Riddell, who created "Shards: In Memoriam," a memorial for COVID-19 victims.
When I actually got to the gallery, I really could see and feel what the shard pieces actually meant,” Bannister said.
Ridell began the clay shard memorial after reading the names of the first 100,000 COVID victims in the New York Times.
"They’re very sharp, they’re painful and the broken pieces of our lives. So, it’s a great metaphor,” Riddell said of the clay shards that make up the memorial.
“Once a piece is broken, you can, or a member is gone, you can never replace that person," Bannister said. "Even if you try and glue them back together, it will never be the same."
On his trip to the west coast, Bannister added one more soul, his mother-in-law, Luther May Cook, to the collection of people remembered in through the exhibit.
“I feel proud my family members are part of that collection. Its very gratifying," Bannister said. “That was three generations of strong women that died due to COVID in one family, my family.”
Though gone from the earth, Bannister says his angels are still with him.
“My two lovely ladies are resting in peace," Bannister said. "They left a good legacy.”
Riddell says she will continue adding names to the exhibit for now. Whenever she does dismantle it, however, she said she plans to use all the shards to make a new piece.