Seven-hundred and twenty-four.
That’s how many folded paper boxes appeared on Lawyer’s Mall outside of the Maryland State House in Annapolis on Friday morning.
Called Soul Boxes, each one represents a Marylander lost to gunfire over the course of a year, including accidental shootings and suicides.
Laura Evans, a spokesperson for the Soul Box Project, explained the boxes are made by volunteers and people who’ve been directly affected by gun violence.
“People put their loved ones faces on the boxes, they’ll put little quotes, they’ll put things inside of the boxes to represent a memory of the person who’s been lost to gunfire,” she said.
Evans said that more than 160,000 Soul Boxes have been created so far as part of the national project.
The Soul Boxes will be displayed on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 16 and 17.
“We hear about the shootings, suicides, gun violence and mass shootings, but until you see it, you don’t get a sense for the real number of lives lost,” Evans said.
Other organizations involved in the project include Moms Demand Action, Students Demand Action, March for Our Lives, and other gun violence prevention advocacy groups.
