Folding cranes to promote “Peace on Earth”

Susan Osborn has always emphasized the importance of the Christmas message of “Peace on earth, good will toward men” during the 17 years that she has been presenting her annual Victorian Valley concerts.

This year, Osborn will take that message further. She will have the chapel adorned with cranes, and she will encourage everyone to fold a crane and include it in the thousand or more that islanders will send to the United Nations as an expression of their desire for peace.

Osborn is joining an effort led by local theater director Jane Alden, who recently directed a play at Orcas Center on how war affected children.

She encouraged cast and audience members to make “a thousand cranes for peace” from origami paper. Since then, others have rallied to the cause.

The Funhouse is now encouraging youngsters to fold cranes, and has set up an area with origami paper and instructions on how to fold them. The kids visiting The Funhouse have all gotten into the act. “Every time I’m in The Funhouse, the kids are folding cranes,” Alden said.

Orcas Center is also participating by setting aside a box in the lobby where people can leave the cranes. Cast members for the upcoming play “Romeo and Juliet” are folding cranes while on breaks during rehearsals, Alden said.

The concept originated with a Japanese girl who attempted to make a thousand cranes after being seriously injured during the atomic bomb attacks at the end of War II. The girl died after folding about 700 cranes, but others in her country finished the job. The thousand cranes have since become a worldwide symbol of the peace movement.

While a small child, Osborn nearly died after being stricken with a serious illness. She was sent to the Mayo Clinic, where a Japanese nurse taught her to fold the cranes. Osborn survived, but she didn’t think about the cranes again until, as an adult, she visited Japan. Her tour included stops at the Peace Museum and a nearby hospital in Hiroshima, site of the first atomic bomb blast. At the hospital, she discovered that many Japanese people who were injured or affected by the bomb remain in a hospital nearly 60 years later. Osborn is a popular figure in Japan who has made many recordings there.

In Thailand, the king asked everybody in the country to fold cranes. After collecting a hundred million of them, he had them dropped on the southern portion of the country, which is populated largely by Muslims, and has been the site of recent violence.

Osborn’s concerts will be held at the Victorian Valley Chapel, Dec. 16, 17, 18 at 7:30 p.m., and Dec. 19 at 5 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Tickets, $18, are available at Darvill’s Rare Prints.

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