Never Forget. 9/11 Remembrance
It took 6 years, from 1966 to 1973 to build The World Trade Center and just 102 minutes from first impact to destroy both towers. The morning of September 11, 2001 a terrorist attack took place against the United States. Two planes were flown into the towers of the World Trade Center located in New York City, a third hit the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C, and a fourth plane crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. The first plane crashed into the 80th floor at 8:45 a.m. ETD. Many believed this to be a mere accident; an unfortunate event. That theory was discredited when 18 minutes later another United Airlines flight crashed into the South Tower. America quickly came to the conclusion they were being attacked. This news rocked America and sent many into a panic. For most the events of 9/11 will be engraved into their minds, the memory of where they were when they first heard the tragic news, what they were doing, and even what they ate that day will be with them until they pass. 14 years later 4 people tell there 9/11 story.
History teacher Robert Kerr tells his story:
I was in this very classroom, room 262, Mr. Theoharis came in and asked if i’d heard about what happened in New York. I had told him no and asked what was going on, he told me to turn on my TV. Even without cable we were able to pull in channel 5, and that was my first image of seeing the towers on fire and the smoke. It was like woah. It was disbelief when you saw those repeated images of the jet planes flying into the trade center, I just thought oh my god, who would do that. The biggest sense of disbelief was when you saw the towers fall. I mean you wouldn’t think that would happen, that everything would just disintegrate from the top down, and yet the terrorist knew that’s what would happen if they got it hot enough and melted the framework. I couldn’t stop thinking in disbelief, woah those things are totally gone.
Here’s what else I remember; before I came to school that day, The Today show was on, and they were yacking about whether Michael Jordan should come out of retirement from basketball and come back and play the sport. I still remember them saying “will he or won’t he”; and in the light of what happened a few minutes later, I thought, man, what a trivial story, this guy comes back to play basketball or not compared to what was about to unfold in New York City where The Today show was located.
I would like to see the buildings that our country put up in fairly fast fashion to show, what you (terrorist) destroyed, we will rebuild and we will come back. The new World Trade center building is a sign of America’s resiliency, we move forward, we don’t stay down.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” George Santayana
French teacher Sarah Wolf tells her story:
I was in fourth grade when 9/11 happened, my classmates and I heard teachers talking a little bit, we didn’t understand what was going on. Being in fourth grade I was inquisitive about the world around me, but couldn’t necessarily understand when someone says to you point blank, it’s hard to read between the lines. When my mom picked me up from school she told me what had happened, and we watched the news, those are images that stay will stay with me for a lifetime.
My freshman year of college I went to New York and visited the 9/11 memorial. I was thinking, this happened, right here. I’m only separated by a single pane of glass, someone’s possessions, a window, something someone might have been touching the very instant the planes hit the tower. And yet I’m alive, but they aren’t, and all that separates you from that is a pane of glass. These people were living their ordinary lives and all of a sudden something happened that changed them forever, and, someone like me is able to stand here and see the aftermath but they’re not able to look at themselves right now. It taught me that if we live in fear it will rule our lives, we’re not going to really enjoy life. We have to acknowledge, yes, things happen everywhere but there are also those simple moments, like when someone says hi to you, or you find a five dollar bill in the streets, it’s things like that, that remind you, yes bad things can happen but good things will happen also.
“Terrorist attacks can shake the foundation of our tallest buildings, but they cannot touch the foundation of America. We will not tire. We will not falter. We will not fail.”
George W Bush
History teacher Dave Johnson tells his story:
I was in my classroom, and the school’s assistant principal came by. It was a passing period, right after the first period of the day and he stopped by. I looked like he was going room to room and he told me there had been a terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and in Washington, D.C. I turned on the television and my classes spent the rest of the day watching, and we watched live, the towers collapsing. I will always remember that, it was shocking. The big story in Washington during those days was the suspected disappearance and murder of a young intern in the house of representatives. Saunder LeeD had gone missing and a congressman who was apparently involved with her was a possible suspect, and that story disappeared. I remember it taking the back seat completely to 9/11 because that was the big story in Washington.
I don’t think things turned out the way the terrorist thought they would turn. I think they had a misconception of America, they had a misconception of what the World Trade Center was really about. They expected the United States to collapse economically. I don’t think it turned out like Osama Bin Laden, and Al Qaeda thought it would. I don’t see them copying that attack again, it ended up in the long run a failure.
“On that terrible day, a nation became a neighborhood, all Americans became New Yorkers.” Governor George Pataki
Music teacher Dana Fanning tells her story:
I was doing doing dishes in my house when I first heard the news. My 7 year old was at school, my four year old and two year old were running around the house. I kept changing the channel hoping it wasn’t true. It was awful, I couldn’t believe it was happening. I was a children’s music minister so I immediately packed up the boys and headed to the church. On the way there I realized I was almost out of gas and needed to stop. Between the time I put the nozzle in my gas tank and turned it on, they changed the gas price from $1.98 to $4.99. I put in my gas, and walked in and said, “This is what I was going to pay for my gas” and I threw my 40 dollars on the counter and left. I was pissed that there were people out there trying to profit on the tragedy that was happening. After all that we got to the church and decided we had to do something for the people. The event rocked the world, it was the biggest thing since John F Kennedy was shot. We had church that night and everybody came, it was packed, people who had never been there were trying to come to grips of what was happening. We had a sanctuary that could fit 1,500 people and there were people standing everywhere.
That night after it happened, it was a Tuesday. I will never forget that Tuesday. I was just freaked out, so I had all the kids sleep in our room with us because we didn’t know what was going to happen. The fear sets in and I’m like gosh, I have to go buy tons of milk and stuff, so we went and bought 6 gallons of milk,and bought a ton of diapers. Others were doing the same and by the time we left there was nothing left on the shelves. We still had stuff left over from the Y2K scare, when they thought 2000 was coming and it’d make all the computers and everything quit and life would just stop. Having the husband I have he made sure we had plenty of food stocked up.
It was funny, as a teenager I had hated history,but then when you start living it, it’s a whole different thing.
It took 100 days for firefighters to extinguish all the fires in New York that were ignited by the attacks. A total of 437 watches and 144 wedding rings were found in the ruins. Weeks following 9/11 alcohol consumption in Manhattan rose 25% while church and synagogue attendance rose 20%. The cleanup and recovery process at Ground Zero lasted longer than a year; with workers doing all they can to clean up debris and start the rebuilding process of the towers. A memorial was built at ground zero that opened in 2006 to remember those whose lives were lost. The memorial includes two large waterfalls and reflecting pools each about an acre in size, where the Twin Towers stood before they fell on 9/11. Surrounding the pools are over 3,000 names inscribed of those who were killed in the World Trade Center, Pentagon, and Flight 93; along with names of those who were killed in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Visitors have traveled from all 50 states and more than 175 nations. Since the opening of the 9/11 memorial in 2011 20 million people have visited and over 3 million people visited the 9/11 memorial museum that opened in May 2014.
