April 19, 1995, was the worst day in Oklahoma’s history.

Thursday, June 14, 2001

April 19, 1995, was the worst day in Oklahoma’s history.

Six years later, Timothy McVeigh finally has paid the ultimate price for launching the deadliest terrorist attack ever on U.S. soil.

Yet in all this news coverage, we saw little mention of why April 19, 1995, also was – paradoxically – the best day in Oklahoma’s history.

On the day of the Murrah bombing and in the weeks and even months afterward, Oklahomans came together as they never had before.

Countless emergency personnel from Oklahoma City, throughout the state and, indeed, across the country worked endless hours, sometimes at great risk, to rescue survivors and to recover the bodies of those who had died in the blast.

Countless medical and other professional healing personnel tended to the injuries of the survivors, both physically and emotionally.

Countless volunteers assisted those efforts in more ways than could be listed here.

Oklahoma City’s and Oklahoma’s triumph over the evil of McVeigh’s horrendous crime did not come Monday when he was executed.

Instead, it already had come six years ago – immediately in the hours, days and weeks following the bombing, when Oklahomans proved to themselves and to the rest of the world that good truly is more powerful than evil.

It is a story that will long outlive McVeigh.