- He was somebody who was so alive, he just represented life, and all of a sudden somebody said he's not here, he's gone.

(guitar music) After all this happened, I started talking to friends of AJ.

At first it was just to sort of talk you know, and then somewhere in that year, I think 2013 I sat down with Craig Vaughn.

That's my first memory of it.

It was weird because we went down to a place that used to be called the Burger Bar, and I forget what it's called now, but it's on Polk.

We met down there and Craig sat down at a table, I always tell the story, and there was a bunch of stuff in the middle of the table like ketchup and stuff so you moved it out of the way, and we looked and it said AJ right there, it was carved, somebody had carved AJ in the middle of that table.

We looked at each other and it was such a weird thing you know?

- We kinda joke with the committee about how he's watching, he's overseeing, you know, and he's messing with us at the same time you know?

- The project is a plaza, an outdoor plaza in downtown Amarillo that would accomplish multiple objectives.

Certainly its primary objective is to honor the memory of AJ Swope.

- And that's the amphitheater that will have a really nice stage with nice lighting and sound, and that will seat about 300 people.

Pass that we have the first responders memorial which will honor all of the men and women who have lost their lives protecting us in the top 26 counties of the Texas Panhandle, and the third section of that is the Texas Panhandle Walk of Fame, and that's going to be several walls that surround the amphitheater, the stage, that honor people from all over our region who have gone on to do really, really cool and great things.

- We need to recognize, in a central spot, folks from all walks of life who have contributed to our well-being over the last 130 years.

- We've got all these, you know, everything from Olympic athletes to, you know, musicians, actors, and just you know political people that we could put on there.

- And that's a pretty long list that he has put together, and it's out there in cyberspace, but we want a tangible spot to honor these people.

From an overall standpoint, certainly, the memorial is there to recognize the contributions that AJ made during his lifetime.

- AJ was driving to Dumas on a Tuesday morning to go talk to a group of retired teachers about wind energy, and a woman committing suicide crossed the center lane, crossed the divided highway, rather, and drove into oncoming traffic for several miles.

She narrowly missed a couple of people and she hit AJ.

AJ in his spirit was an all-inclusive person, in his day job and how he brought people together, and this plaza just really embodies that.

AJ touched so many lives, not just in Amarillo, but across the entire Panhandle and I don't think any of us realized how big his impact was until he wasn't here with us.

AJ was multifaceted.

He was a former newsman, he was a wind energy executive, and at night he was a musician.

And so as far as wind energy, he worked to bring our entire region together so we understood the importance of it and helps just move that whole movement along.

As far as music he actually started something where musicians in Amarillo started working together with each other to help promote and move forward as opposed to working against each other.

- He was mostly self-taught.

The writing was all his, it was just-- and his voice was just amazing.

- He wasn't trying to impress anybody, wasn't trying to, you know, make you love him, you just loved him, you know, you just loved the music.

- I've never experienced that kind of loss before because it's almost like the world stopped turning, you know, that day.

- People in this community have wanted to do something for AJ since the day we lost him.

- We didn't want to create a whole other organization, because we're gonna build this and we're gonna give this away at the end of the day.

So the Area Foundation set up a fund, the AJ Swope Fund.

- The project itself has a price tag of about $2.5 million.

We are in the process of raising that $2.5 million as we speak today, and we hope to have those resources raised as soon as possible.

The property on which this memorial will reside, is City of Amarillo property.

We have had the privilege of visiting with the council and senior leadership at City Hall and they have committed that piece of ground, just south of the ballpark, for this purpose.

So in the sense of a public/private partnership that's the first piece of the public/private partnership arrangement.

We also believe that that green space will be very important in opening up the area to the east and to the south of the MPEV -- the old warehouse district -- to long-term development particularly the idea of residential development in downtown.

- This is gonna be something that, you know, our kids, and our grandkids, and our great-grandkids, and for generations to come can walk over here and you know hear somebody playing an acoustic guitar in the background while they're looking at names and getting on their phones to find out information about these great people.

Here's AJ Swope & The Last Train Home.

- I call them AJ's champions, AJ's four champions.

They loved and love AJ more than, you know really more than comprehension.

The time and effort, and energy these people have invested from their lives to do this for him, is just almost, just unbelievable, that he was just so loved.

- I'm not sure that he would think his name needs to be on it, like most people you know, just the humble part of him, but to see so many people come together to honor so many other people, once again it goes right in line with what he was trying to do with music and wind energy.

Just, he loved the Panhandle, he loved downtown and everything about this project just screams AJ and I think he would just be ecstatic.

- He would be overwhelmed, he would be very overwhelmed, but if he could've played there, that's what he would have loved.

(guitar plays) (upbeat music)