Less than 10 miles from the finish line of the Boston Marathon, where three were killed and 176 injured Monday, lies a billboard with a one-word message: Cowards. As the manhunt for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev continues, the region remains paralyzed with fear over what might still transpire and reeling from what already has. The billboard seems to sum it up well. Located off the I-93 expressway that crosses the city, it belongs to the local chapter of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) union. The chapter, Local 103, usually uses the billboard for union-related and community messages but that changed Tuesday after the two bombs exploded. Since then, it has rotated every 10 seconds between the “Cowards” sign directed at the Boston bombing suspects , and another that reads, “Pray for Boston.” “It was Local 103′s way of shouting out our feelings of anger: Cowards,” business manager Michael P. Monahan told ABC News of the Billboard. None of the union’s 7,500 members were directly hurt in the explosions, according to a representative, but they have another strong connection. The town where the chapter’s HQ is located, Dorchester, Mass., is the same town where the blasts’ youngest victim, Martin Richard, and his family lived. Richard, 8, died while attending the marathon festivities with his mother, father and two siblings. His mother and sister sustained “serious” injuries. “No other word or words came to my mind when I heard of the tragic event, when a family from our neighborhood was effected so tragically,” Monahan said. Local 103 says it to keep the billboard devoted to the Boston Marathon survivors but is working on incorporating new messages going forward.
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Cowards Billboard Lights Up Boston in Wake of Attacks
