New documentary visits the bedrooms of kids killed in school shootings
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Their bedrooms are just how they left them, but they never came back. And a new documentary on Netflix takes viewers inside those rooms, seemingly frozen in time, of children killed in school shootings.
“It’s tougher to look at than a crime scene, in some ways,” said CBS News correspondent Steve Hartman. “And in some cases, it looks like a crime scene, because you know how kids live. Stuff is strewn on the floor, and it's just, it's their life frozen in time.”
Hartman, known generally for feel-good segments including his “On The Road” series, worked with photographer Lou Bopp for seven years to document the rooms left behind by children and then preserved by their parents. He said it was a personal mission that went against his brand.
“I felt like the whole country was also growing numb, and I wanted to shake us out of that,” Hartman said. “I feel like the nation owes it to the parents to feel some of the pain.”
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The documentary is available Monday, Dec. 1 on Netflix. MPR News host Cathy Wurzer talked to Hartman about the project.
Listen to the conversation by clicking the player above. Below is a transcript, lightly edited for clarity.
As reporters, we parachute into all manner of horrific situations and we cover it intensely, and then we leave. You decided to stay. Why is that?
I’d done some essays at the end of the week for the CBS Evening News about school shootings, and it was kind of my job to sort of find the — this is gonna sound strange — but find the uplifting angle. You know, find something positive to come out of this. Maybe it’s the hero teacher, or something else that’s kind of a positive spin.
And I kind of got tired of doing that. I felt bad because I was growing numb to the tragedies. Like there were just so many of them; I couldn't remember them all.
I certainly did not remember the victims, and I felt like the whole country was also growing numb, and I wanted to shake — shake us out of that.
What was it like to walk into some of those bedrooms?
It's haunting.
It’s tougher to look at than a crime scene, in some ways. And in some cases it looks like a crime scene, because you know how kids live. Stuff is strewn on the floor, and it’s just, it’s their life frozen in time.
And you look around the room and you can see all the evidence of how they lived their lives, what was valuable to them. You see your own child's room. At least I do.
Because sometimes the exact same items — like that little bank that you have, that you can so easily break into — you know, the kids bank. My kid has that too. So, you see your own child.
And I think that’s kind of important because I think a lot of times you see a picture of a beautiful child who died in a school shooting, and you think, “Oh, that's somebody else’s kid. That’ll never happen to me.” But you look around the rooms, and I think you start to imagine it being your child. I think we all need that wake-up call.
How are the parents to talk to?
Every time I knock on the door, I get little butterflies in my stomach, because you never know what to say. Everything seems trite, and getting out those first words is always hard for me, but after a while you realize they want you there.
They’re eager to tell the story.
The folks we talked to, at least, welcomed us in and I didn’t feel like I was being a nuisance to them, whereas I would have been if I knocked on the door the week of the tragedy. I felt like at this point, by the time we got there, they were ready to open up and share.
And the worst thing that can happen to these parents is that their child be forgotten. And so, I’m very grateful that I was able to play a role in in reminding America who these children were.
Did your bosses at CBS know what you were doing all these years?
No. They do now.
And there’s a reason for that. As you mentioned, I’m sort of the “feel-good” guy. That’s my brand, and this is so far off brand, I was worried that they would say no.
Also in our business, the most forward-thinking we are is maybe next week or next month. If I said I want to work on a project that was going to be done seven years from now, the answer would definitely be “no”. But if I did it on my own and didn’t tell anybody, then I could ask forgiveness later.
Is there a place for more recent events, like the shooting at Annunciation Catholic School and Church, for stories that could be told from those parents’ viewpoints that you might be looking at in the future?
It’s possible. I will send letters to the parents of Fletcher (Merkel) and Harper (Moyski) at some point and offer for Lou (Bopp) and I to come and photograph the rooms, not necessarily for a story, just as a favor.
Because when we were done shooting the rooms, we put the pictures of each child into their own little photo books. And hopefully that allows them to, one day, move past the room.
Because for a lot of these parents, the room — it’s like an albatross that hangs over them. It brings comfort, but it’s also a source of pain. They don’t know what to do with it.
There was one family that, after we documented it and sent them the photo book, they were finally able to pack it up and they wanted to move, and they were able to move.
So, I don't know if I’ll ever do any more stories with it, but the mission will carry on.
Do you feel like you’ve been changed because of this work?
Yeah, I’m not numb anymore.
There have been a few school shootings since we finished the documentary and any time I hear of it, it’s not a name and a number anymore. It's more my child. And that may sound like it’s a painful thing to go through, but it’s really not.
I like having opened myself up to that sadness, because I think one: it’s the beginning of a solution. But two: I feel like I owe it to the parents to feel a little bit of their pain.
I feel like the nation owes it to the parents to feel some of the pain.
