Where Were You on 911?
I was sleeping in that morning when my son called me on the phone, woke me up and said, “Momma, you need to turn on the tv. I think we are at war or something.” The second airplane had just hit the World Trade Center.
My oldest son was in the Air Force and I knew he had some very big and important war games that day. On that morning everyone was worried about a strike against all the military. (By the way, he has some very interesting stories about the airmen being confused about the real world terror threat level and the war games threat level. The vast majority of them thought they were still playing war games when the change in threat level occurred.)
Like all Americans, I was scared, confused, and just kept thinking, “The idiot son is President.” Turns out, I was right.
If you feel the spirit move you, share your memories of that day.
I was in school and had an appointment with a counselor and one of my students. I walked from my classroom to the counselor’s office and saw people crying in the hallways. Someone said something about New York, but it didn’t quite register. I went to the meeting and then back to my classroom where the students were glued to the TV. Got back just in time to see that horrific second plane smash into the other tower. Needless to say, we did not have much learning going on at the academic level, but a lot of learning going on in real time. I am not really sure, that, at the end of the day, we really grasped the situation as it unfolded.
1My sister called from Ohio and said “TURN ON THE TV; A PLANE JUST FLEW INTO THE TRADE CENTER.” I said “Oh, that’s happened before”, thinking of the tiny plane that flew into the Trade Center years before. “NO, THIS IS DIFFERENT! OH, THERE’S ANOTHER ONE!” So I turned on the TV. I watched some and worried a lot and listened mostly because I could not stand to see what was happening. Then after a few days GWB said we were going to attack Iraq. WHAT?! Talk about a pack of lies. Sure, we oughta remember it but not blame all the Muslims and Iraq for what happened. Lots of folks still blame Iraq, thanks to GWB. I was active in the peace movement for a long time. Which reminds me, Jane Addams of Hull House fame was one of the founders of the first peace movement in the USA.
2Another short story. Longtime friends of ours had a son working in NYC on 9/11. They were worried sick. He was okay but was one of hundreds, maybe thousands, who walked north and kept walking. There wasn’t any way to go anywhere. He walked many miles that day to get as far as possible from the Trade Center and its destruction.
3I was living in DC at the time and worked about a mile from the White House. My sister and her family lived (and live) in Manhattan about three blocks from the World Trade Center. When I heard the news, I started trying to get them on the phone. None of us had cell phones back then and they didn’t answer their landline (fortunately because they had all left early for work and school), so I was trying to track down my sister’s work number and sending emails to every address I could think of. I spent about an hour on this fruitless endeavor before it occurred to me that the national news was saying attacks on NYC and Washington and that my parents back here in Texas were probably worried about both of us. They were easy to reach and had heard from my sister. It didn’t even occur to me to worry about my own situation until then. (After all, the Pentagon is in Virginia and nothing happened in Washington itself.)
After that, work sent us home and I walked the whole six miles because I was afraid someone might attack the subways.
4At work in the office, alone. The rest of the crew had just left for a meeting on Capitol Hill. I had the radio on. Someone called me even before there was a broadcast. I thought someone had accidentally hit the Tower just like there was the accident with the Empire State Building many, many years ago. I no sooner hung up than the radio station went at it. They even called one of the Arab Embassies in town. All they got was a custodian who answered the phone and did not speak much English at all. I could not reach the crew by cell phone. Even my land line was down. There were sirens screaming everywhere which would be natural since we were only minutes away by car from the Pentagon. I finally wrote a note “Gone somewhere I can shoulder a rifle” and left. Went actually to the military base next to my home. Could not get in. Some 19 year old girl in uniform was physically throwing vehicles out the main gate and she was armed to the teeth and then some. Went home. Wondered where the hell husband was cuz he also worked close to the Pentagon. Stood on my front lawn. Looked at magic blue sky. Sang Amazing Grace. Swore that whatever whoever tore down, I would spend my life building and rebuilding whatever I could. And I did. (Husband did show up later.)
5I was coming back to Boston from CT where I’d been arranging hospice care for my father and I stopped to see my younger daughter at Brandeis University. Security was very intense there because the Board of Trustees–nearly all prominent Jews, many with strong connections to Israel– was meeting on campus that day.
6My brother lived in Jersey City and took a PATH train to work that terminated under the WTC so I had a few moments of anxiety before we heard from him. His office was in the 50s and he had reached there before the attack but he had no way back. Eventually some of the harbor boats started ferrying people to the NJ side of the river. I was just in NYC for a wedding and my brother took me around the new building site. It still seems very unreal to me.
My then-wife at the time was in Montreal running a conference, her sister called me just as I was taking the kids (9 and almost 6) to school to tell me about the first plane. I had the same first thoughts as Marge. I turned on TV just in time to see the 2nd. I dropped them off and was in line at my coffee shop near my train when they mentioned the Pentagon. I decided not to go to work, as my office was two blocks from Sears Tower (and, in the other direction, a few blocks from Hull House, Marge!)
I spent the day on the couch watching the whole thing unfold. I spoke to my wife a couple of times. Finally, late that evening, my brother-in-law and I climbed into the minivan and drove to Montreal to rescue her and her co-workers. We drove straight through the night, got there late afternoon, showered, ate room service, then drove back, arriving back home on the morning of the 13th.
Flash forward 10 years, new home, new wife. We were in attendance at the 10-year observance at Shanksville. A beautiful, moving ceremony led by our President.
7I was in the process of making a right turn into the Bomber Factory in Grand Prairie when the first reports of the first plane came over the radio.
8It’s kinda foggy this memory. I don’t remember if someone called me or I just turned on the TV after getting up and then hearing the broadcaster talking about a plane hitting the World Trade Center. I just stood there, in more of a daze thinking about very little except my 80 year old Uncle Bob who had landed at Guadalcanal and called him. In the course of our conversation I asked him if he ever thought he would ever see a horror like this in his lifetime, thinking of all the men who had gone to war to fight for a righteous cause and that we had seen pure evil come to us in this country.
9I started a new job at DPS the month before 9/11. I was talking to a Vietnam vet, a former pilot, when one of our coworkers came down and said, “A plane just flew into the World Trade Center.” I looked at him, he looked at me, and we both thought, “Accident? Intentional?” He pulled out a little 9″ television he kept to watch TV on his lunch hour. We were watching when the second plane flew in. At that moment, we knew it was no accident. I woke up my sister and told her to turn on the TV, then called my dad, and was back at the TV in time to see the buildings collapse. Oh, my God.
When I called my dad, I found out my mom was in Kansas and was supposed to fly home (San Antonio airport) that day. The planes had already been grounded. She was worried because she was supposed to turn her rent car in. We told her to forget the reservation, hang on to it, and just drive home. It turned out to be the right thing to do and the highways were practically empty.
DPS went on full alert. The State Operations Center was activated. Buildings were locked down. Eventually, they released non-essential personnel early. Though not Catholic, I stopped at a Catholic church on the way home because I knew they’d have the sanctuary open. I was not the only one in there praying and crying. Driving home, the fact that the skies were empty of all planes was so freaky. I live and work on the flight path for the local airport, so I am used to seeing them constantly. The empty skies gave me the jitters.
My sister married a man from Paris, France, the previous year. We got an e-mail from her in-laws that day with some lovely expressions of sympathy for our country. They ended it with, “We are all Americans today.”
10I was on my way into work. My husband called me with something akin to angry panic in his voice and said, “Do you have the radio on? Someone’s bombing the WTC!”
I got the adult version -and had for several subsequent weeks- of the violated feeling a kid gets when the home has been robbed.
The thing that really sticks with me though, is how eerily quiet it was during the time the airlines were grounded. In close second was how fast the grocery stores become empty when food is no longer moved by truck, air, or rail. That really gave me pause. The backlash of misdirected hatred was pretty astounding too; of course, we are still there!
11I also wanted to add that the thingsI remember that got driven completely from the news by this were GWB’s sinking, floundering presidency, the summer of the shark attacks, and Chandra Levy. Afterwards it was anthrax and war.
And that funny show “That’s My Bush” was ended.
12I had just pulled into the parking at UST and ejected a tape I had been listening to. The first words I heard were Peter Jennings’ horror at seeing the second plane hit the tower.
13I was living in Boston. Had finished an article late the night before, and the 11th was all set to be perfect – it was a beautiful day, cool and sunny, I could take the day off. My brother called from Houston a little after 9:00, and said he just wanted to be sure I wasn’t flying anywhere that day. I thought he was worried about a storm that had been heading for us and changed its mind. “Oh, no,” I said, “that went out to sea.”
“What are you talking about?” he asked. “Turn on the TV.”
I did, and it was suddenly not a beautiful day any more.
14I’d pulled my back and called in to tell my supervisor, a NYC native, that I was running late. Her response was that a plane had hit one of the WTC towers. No invention here, a voice in my head said “there are more [planes].” I was speaking with her as I turned on the television and saw the second tower hit. We stayed on the phone together and I said to her as I watched the inferno and the bldgs start to fail, “oh my god, where can they go?” I had lived in NYC in the 1980s, and remember when I’d land at La Guardia, the plane circled around the towers, and my looking out the plane window and thinking I was home, because NYC was a place where I was very comfortable.
While driving the next day, Górecki’s Symphony No. 3 “Sorrowful Songs”, a piece I’ve long loved, came on the radio. The tears came easily, soon I was sobbing, and had to pull over.
15I got the kids off to school and sat down with a cup of coffee and Good Morning America. I turned in on as Charlie Gibson was showing us pictures of the burning World Trade Center, but no one knew why. There was some talk of a plane. Then the second plane came into the picture, and as it got closer, Charlie says, “oh my God, oh my God, oh my God” and it hit. That still brings tears to my eyes.
We had a commerical and the real news guys took over.
I think Charlie was crying somewhere.
I never left the television the rest of the day. I considered getting my children from school, but decided that was panic talking.
16I was in my classroom (third graders). My principal came across the hall from her office asking if she could turn on my TV as she had heard something was going on. We saw the first tower burning and saw the second tower struck. We heard reports of other possible attacks. I turned off the TV. Parents started coming for their kids. Many had to stay. They were scared. I spent the day assuring them they were safe and I wouldn’t let anything happen to them. My wife called from her school. We wanted to hear each other’s voices. I hoped my kids believed me and never knew how I felt.
17Heard the report of the first plane on the radio while driving to work. After I got to work, I checked the internet, but it was down. So I pulled out a tiny TV I kept in my office in time to see the second builing collapse. We were all sent home since our building was directly under a flight path. I do remember finally needing to rest my brain and turning to the Cartoon Network, only to find one of the old Warner Brothers cartoons involved a building collapsing.
18I was in the bathroom getting ready for work and I had the little radio on and heard that a plane had hit the WTC. I went out to the living room and turned on the TV just as the 2nd plane was coming in! I went back into the bathroom, continued to get ready for work, fixed oatmeal that I would zap at work and packed my lunch and headed for Oakland … I worked in a 27 story building across from Lake Merritt and my cubicle was on the 25th at that time. I was on “automatic” … I cried all the 33 miles to work, zapped my oatmeal and choked that down and finally someone came by and said: “Go home!” So I did and spent the day in front of the TV … horrified by the images and especially so when folks started jumping out of windows!
The day, the images, everything is so imblazoned on my brain there is no way I can forget any of it unless I lose my mind as I get older!!
And then when I was able to go back to work … absolutely NO planes … anyway … not flying into Oakland or San Francisco airports … and it was almost like the birds themselves had abandoned the skies.
We all lost something that day … we all did!!
19I was working at a Naval Reserve facility in New Orleans on that morning. On the screen was a little scroll bar, and I saw something about an explosion at the World Trade Center. Bringing up the New York Times website, I could see the pictures of the Tower that had been hit first, and I was thinking to myself, “Ok, it’s clear weather, no clouds…” By that time I knew something was seriously wrong.
We had televisions set up in our break room, all of which were showing CNN. A number of us were in there when suddenly on the screen appeared another jet which slammed into the second building. At that point, I turned to a co-worker and said without thinking, “Congratulations, we’ve just seen a terrorist attack live on television.” Then I added almost instantly, “Any bets we hear from Washington of something happening there?”
The rest of the day was a blur, people being allowed to go home after noon and not report in until a few days later. But I didn’t need to hear the news afterwards. I already knew what they were going to say, all the little pieces having fallen into place in my mind.
20I was living in DC at the time, and the first I heard of it was when my sister called to ask if I was OK. I lived about as far from the Pentagon as it’s possible to be in DC, but my brother and sister-in-law worked downtown, though near Georgetown than the Mall, but her worry knew no geography.
I and my family were safe, but I didn’t think all my friends and neighbors were, and spent a long time waiting for a fourth, and after reports of the Pennsylvania crash, fifth or sixth plane to come in.
I was doing my nephew’s carpool that afternoon, but the school quickly sent an email suggesting people not pick them up early. I was happy to wait, because I was sure their teachers could deal better with scared eleven year olds better than I could. I don’t know how the kids were at noon, but at 3:30 I had a car full of excited boys begging me to take them to the Pentagon so they could see the fire. (youth! a wonderful pain in the ass.)
But what cared me even more about that time was when the DC Snipers showed up a couple of weeks later (you may not remember if you weren’t there). One of their first attacks was near an intersection I drove through every day. Or course we assumed this was a terrorist attack, and there were reports of armed bands at that intersection. Also, early reports said they drove a white van; I was running a catering service at the time and drove a white van; I stayed off the street for as much as I could until their truck got bigger (actually they used a small car with holes drilled out the back).
I didn’t then, but now it seems so strange how big a relief it was to realize, “Oh, it’s just a random murderous madman on the loose!” But that felt like good news in those times.
21On the night of the 10th, I kept waking up into a dark smoky room. There was a wall of mirrors with the bathroom door to one side and a joining sliding doors out to the hot tub on the wall. The reflective surfaces were confusing as was the smoke.
22I woke up three times and the last time needed to use the bathroom. Instead of walking into the bathroom, I ran full on into the mirror wall, hitting it so hard that the boom! woke my boyfriend, and left me with a scrape and black eye. It was almost time to get up (6AM Ca time) and when he went in to check the stock market–normal 1st thing–it wasn’t there–he went in and turned the TV on, and then came back into the bedroom, white as a sheet, turned on the TV as the second plane hit, and said, “This is what you saw last night.” I knew that the smoky reflective surfaces were what the dying people where dealing with and to this day it makes me weep to even think about it.
The world was with us that day and if we had moved on the true villains (only the Saudi’s were allowed to fly that day and the attackers were mostly Saudi) then, instead of the BS that followed, the world would not have been against us…I lay that directly at Shrubs feet, and the so very evil Cheney
I was on the computer in chat with my oldest son, who was at work in Manhattan. He told me to turn on the TV, which I did, and I asked him if he knew where his youngest brother was. Usually they came into Manhattan together from Brooklyn. That day they hadn’t so we were anxious for almost an hour until my youngest got to where his brother worked. He didn’t know what had happened until he arrived at the subway station at Union Square and saw the building on fire.
When the two brothers got together, they decided to head for the Twin Towers, to try to find the older one’s roomie, who worked in the first tower. It took quite a bit of time, but they found him. He said he had heard the announcement from Security, telling him and the others to stay put, but his gut told him to “get the hell out of Dodge” so he ran down the stairs and escaped before either building collapsed. When they returned to My oldest’s workplace, they contacted me and proceeded to walk out of Manhattan across the Brooklyn Bridge. Within a short period of weeks, both of them decided to leave New York. I remember thinking that they had both lost any innocence they may have had about life after this event.
23BTW, I lived in Omaha, NE at the time and apparently, George Bush was brought to Offutt AFB to shelter underground at the SAC headquarters there.
24I took my girls to school, and then I went back home to finish getting ready for work. We always listed to Kidd Kraddick in the Morning on the radio, and I hurried inside and turned on the radio to hear him finish a funny bit, while muting the TV. That’s when I realized Kidd’s voice had changed… from his fun, goofy Kidd to serious, this-is-bad Kidd. The 2nd plane had just hit. I looked in the mirror at our muted TV screen, and as I saw the two burning towers reflected there, I thought, “This isn’t real unless I turn around”, but it was. I called for my husband to come look, then I called my (travel agency) office, which was on the 62nd floor of 901 Main (the tallest one w/the green neon) in downtown Dallas. My coworkers had no TV or radio, and had no idea. I was on the phone with them when the Pentagon was hit, and they decided to evacuate (way before the building management did). My husband begged me to stay home, but I drove to a branch office near downtown to field the many phone calls. I had one client who insisted on getting home from PA. I reserved a minivan for him at a suburban Sears that he drove back to Texas, along with several other stuck travelers. They were the first ones back. Our building opened the next day w/armed guards in the lobby. The suddenly-empty skies were creepy, but then when the planes were allowed to land at Love Field a few days later, THEY were suddenly terrifying. I cried while driving to and from work for weeks afterwards. It’s probably why I work from home now.
One other memory: Of course the news was on every TV channel but one: A syndicated channel was showing a typically appalling episode of Jerry Springer. As I saw the people fight while the audience screamed “jer-RY jer-RY”, I remember saying, “THIS is why the terrorists hate us. We look like idiots to the rest of the world.”
25I had an AAUW committee meeting @ my home that a.m. One member phoned & said she wouldn’t attend, that I should turn on my television. Some of us met anyway & I was glad for the distraction & for the connectedness with friends. My son phoned from Africa (more than I had done when terrorists had bombed Nairobi — he had been on the coast, but his in-laws worked in downtown Nairobi). In the afternoon I had a memoir writing class @ UTEP’s Center for Lifelong Learning. I was glad for the chance to set down my thoughts & feelings in a safe & supportive environment with fellow seniors.
26It was the final day of the Professional Photographers of New England annual conference in Sturbridge, Mass. My husband and I were on a committee packing up photographs which had been on display at the hotel. Someone came in to tell us about the first plane, which we all though must have been a tragic accident. Kept the TV on, though, and when the second plane hit we were all beyond .stunned. The final day of the conference was cancelled and everybody who could do so went home. A number of our Canadian photographer friends were stuck in the US for over a week.
We drove back to Vermont on the Mass Pike and I-91 which were eerily empty. Lots of military jets in the gorgeous blue sky. It looked like a perfect New England autumn day. The day that changed everything.
27I was teaching at my elementary school and had classes all morning and didn’t know what had happened until lunchtime. This was in a suburb outside of Pittsburgh and, as you know, the brave people on Flight 93 were in the process of diverting that flight from its course. The parents heard there was a flight going near Pittsburgh and ran up to get their children, the downtown area was evacuated and for a long time nobody could smile.
28A friend who knew I didn’t watch TV called saying to turn on the TV. She wouldn’t answer why so I dutifully turned on the TV. In time to watch the second plane fly into the World Trade Center.
Having been raised in New York and having started my working life there, my first thought was that they weren’t trying to kill people, as unlike the rest of the country, where the work day is 8 -5, in New York it’s 9-5 and these attacks happened before most people were at work.
I was flying to New York pretty frequently those days as my father had just died the previous April and there was a lot of support my mom needed. One of the times, soon after 9-11, on the beach there with my ex-sister-in-law, we saw a plane come down in smoke at LaGuardia Airport very close by and hurried back to the car to get home, as she expected all the bridges would get closed. Meantime, friends from Austin were calling to see if I was all right. That turned out, in fact, to be an accident. But, boy, was everyone jittery.
The day of 9-11, I was planning to call my mom anyway (in the suburbs of New York) because, as I mentioned earlier my father had died a few months before and Sep 11 was their anniversary so I knew she’d be thinking about him and missing him. The first thing she said was, “That Bush.” She figured he was responsible. Later on, I came to the same conclusion that Bush and Cheney had engineered the event as a false flag to start their charming wars.
29I was watching the events unfold while talking on the phone with my best friend in Houston. I remember watching the first tower fall and having an inappropriate response to what I was witnessing. I think it was not being able to cope with the carnage I was witnessing. I had lost both my parents within 18 months of September 11th and at 45 years old I was scared and wanted them to comfort me and tell me it was all going to be ok.
309/11 was my son’s 30th birthday. Big party planned, food prepared, beer on ice. I had just ended a long term temp job. First thing that morning I was outside catching up on yard work. Came in for lunch, turned on TV, back and forth to the kitchen. Living in VA, the station was covering DC. After a bit I realized something big had happened but the TV was not answering my questions. Called my daughter in NY. The confusion that takes place when two people are talking but don’t understand what each other knows took place. She tells me about the WTCs. We lived in NJ when the WTCs were being built; one of the places we took visitors. They can NOT fall down just because a plane crashed into them!!! Finally I ask about the people (in the buildings) and she lists the nephews and friends in NYC/DC who are okay! Reluctantly she tells me they have not heard from nor can they contact my son or wife who live in Hoboken. They would have taken the PATH or ferry to the WTCs but had unexpectedly been laid off. Were they job hunting that day? Now how was it that I was the only one who knew they were deep sea fishing off LI that day?? (another story) Was I sure? They did not learn of the disaster until they came ashore. One nephew also lived in Hoboken saw the second plane hit the tower in real time. Of course the party was cancelled. They handed out the food to people on the street. All of my children knew someone who did not return home that day, especially a number who lived in Hoboken. Son and DIL did suffer some health issues due to smoke and ash from the WTCs. Now they live on the other coast.
(one year I thought Sept 11 fell on a Wednesday and called to wish him a H.B…..a day late! He has never let me forget that his motCynthiaher did not know the day of his birth. That is why I knew his plans for that day.)
31My sister and mom lived on LI at the time and for a time, all the bridges were closed so no one could get on or off the island. My brother in laws lunch in the city was cancelled and he watched the second tower fall from NJ.
My daughter had just started at McGill University and the US/Canadian border was shut down tight. So, she could not get home nor could we get to her.
My oldest son, the previous week, had flown the same flight that had crashed into the Pentagon. Which was 8 miles from my cousin’s house.
I was in an interfaith meeting. They closed all state and federal offices in NY by 12pm. So we suddenly went into emergency mode, for food and shelter for people.
I do remember worrying that bush would get us into a nuclear war, by bombing the country that was responsible for this attack.
I did not know anybody who died, but my heart still hurts for those who lost someone.
32I woke up about 8 and went outside to buy a WaPo and went back upstairs to read it and drink coffee with my husband. We normally don’t watch TV in the morning and we didn’t turn on the radio until about 9:45 to listen to the Diane Rehm show at 10 on NPR. We thought at first that this was some elaborate joke NPR was pulling–sorta like a reinterpretation of “War of the Worlds”–it was just too outlandish. Something struck us that this might actually be happening, so we turned on the TV.
I had a appointment later that day to get a haircut, so I called the salon to see what I should do. No answer. The salon was close to downtown and I wasn’t aware of it at the time, but DC was in gridlock. Everybody in the city was trying to get out at the same time and a main part of the highway south by the Pentagon was closed. We all learned then that the idea of evacuating the city was always going to be a non-starter. If we ever need to get out of Dodge in a hurry, it will have to be on foot–and my brother lives 30 miles away.
Remembering all this now brings back the sheer surreal sense that stayed with up for over a week. But, what makes me mad all over again is not that a group of fanatics with access to unlimited funds could do this. No, it’s the sorry way C-Plus Augustus (Charlie Pierce’s name for Dubya)
33used this as an excuse to invade Iraq. Tell me again–why isn’t he and Darth Cheney sitting in the dock at The Hague?
I was getting ready for work and listing to NPR, actually running a bit early, when NPR reported the first plane had struck. I quickly ran to the living room to turn on the TV and saw the second plane hit. By the time I made it to my morning meeting, the second tower had fallen.
34I was near Tampa Florida at Nielson, working with a group of fellow engineers on the new HDTV system. Nielsen had just put in wireless Internet and one of the engineers had a lap top with a wireless connection. He was looking at a news site. When the second plane hit, we called off the meeting. I drove the 1301 miles back to my home outside NY. My village lost about 12 FDNY men. My company, which had space in the North Tower lost one man at our transmitter site. A friend lost a wife, my best friend at work lost a cousin. Phone lines were tied up, but I did reach my wife, who had heard from my son by then. I ended up calling my ex wife to let her know the boy was OK. Her husband called me a few days later to thank me for keeping her informed. We’ve been civil the last 20 years, but not much more than civil.
My wife worked in midtown Manhattan, her building was evacuated, but they were let back in quickly. She did have trouble getting home.
My son had just gotten hired by the Administration Department of the City of New York. His Disaster job was to report to the Emergency Command Center, as a runner. He got sent to City Hall to carry something for the Mayor and was trapped briefly with the Mayor’s Party.
By the time they got out of there, the Emergency Command Center was gone. He got sent up to the Passenger Ship Terminals on the upper West Side, where the city had taken over the piers to use as a new Emergency Command Center. Who ever was in charge of setting up these large empty spaces went into panic mode and my son took over. Two days later he was Director of Communications and Liaison NYC Emergency Command Center. This is like going from recruit private to full Colonel in 48 hours. Literally, as a Director he ranked with a Police Inspector.
He spent the rest of the Mayor’s term as his Deputy Press Secretary.
35My mother passed away in early 2002, but on that fateful day in 2001 she lived in a senior citizen apartment near a suburban train station west of Chicago. I worked in the Loop and would park my car at her place in the morning to catch the train. I was just parking about 7:50 Chicago time when a flash came over the car radio that apparently a plane struck the World Trade Center. Rather than head for the station, I detoured into Mom’s place and turned on the Today Show, just in time to see the second plane fly into the second tower. Matt Lauer and Katie Couric didn’t jump to conclusions, but it was instantly obvious that these were no accidents.
A few minutes later I called the office to say that I wasn’t coming in, because they probably would be shutting down by the time I got there. My boss laughed sarcastically, but by 10 a.m. the entire Chicago Loop was shutting down and tens of thousands of suburban commuters were headed home. With few outbound trains on a normal morning schedule, it took hours before Metra could round up enough trains to load them up and ship them out.
I drove home and spent most of the day watching the national calamity unfold on TV. September 11 that year was a Tuesday, and by unfortunate coincidence the date is my wife’s birthday. Air traffic was grounded for a day or two afterwards, but on Thursday we went for supper at a local restaurant only to encounter Dennis Hastert and his wife having dinner at a nearby table. Hastert’s district was in the western suburbs and at the time he was Speaker of the House and third in presidential succession. Some very large and serious-looking bodyguards were seated at an adjoining table, their heads on a constant swivel to look over other people in the room.
I knew Hastert two decades before when he was a state representative in Springfield, but decided that this particular evening was not a good one to walk over and say hello. It was a very strange time.
36UmptyDump, what train station? I was in Elmhurst. Read above: I made the same decision. My boss was more supportive.
37daChipster – Hinsdale, where there are lots of Zone D nonstops during rush hours that get us to and from Union Station in about 20 minutes. I live about five miles southwest. It’s just fascinating how so many of these recollections intersect for so many of us in different parts of the country. It also gives you the perspective that JJ’s customers are quite a diverse, astute and politically connected lot. If my wife and I make a drive to DC sometime soon, I’d like to make a side trip to Shanksville. I hear that the memorial site is very worth the visit.
38Umpty – your comments are spot on! I recommend the side trip. At the time the visitor center wasn’t built, and the memorial was dedicated that day. It was hard to get a feel for the place that special day with so MANY visitors, and all the foofaraw associated with the news crews and security. I want to go back when it is quieter.
The spot of the crash itself is only viewable at a distance, but the boulder that marks it has a quiet beauty and dignity that transcended the hubbub of the day. I was moved.
Do go! And…let me know if you’re passing through Columbus. We can meet for dinner or to hoist a few.
39Ohio?
40Yep.
41Memories of that day… I’ll share a few from later.
I already had train tickets from Maryland to Boston for Saturday, four days later. The train was full, since planes were still grounded. Everyone got quiet when we neared New York City. You can see the skyline of lower Manhattan before the train goes under the river, and smoke was still rising from where the towers had been.
The next Monday I walked past the chapel at Boston University. Two of the downed planes had flown out of Boston, and there had been a memorial service outside the chapel. I glanced at one of the notes left beside the burned-down candles– it said, “I’ll see you when I get there.”
One thought I had had as I watched the TV footage of the collapsing towers over and over– I guess we all hoped that the next time we watched, it wouldn’t happen– was that a lot of people had just died, and that a lot more would die in the reaction to it.
42I was teaching at the University of Montevallo in Alabama, and that day a colleague came in to work about 8:00 or so. She said a plane had hit the WTC. Thinking it was just a small plane or some such, but still curious, I went to my classroom and turned on the TV. I was dumbfounded by what I saw happening. I watched there by myself for awhile, saw the second plane hit, then decided I really didn’t want to be alone for this. Downstairs the rest of the faculty/staff were watching. When the building fell, my friend said,very curiously in a voice without emotion, “20,000 people work there.” It was really eerie.
43At this point I realized that my husband was at home alone. He was deaf but watched TV almost constantly since he was otherwise disabled and unable to get out much. I was afraid he might not be able to fully understand what was happening. I ran home (a 3 minute walk) and sure enough, he was there somewhat wide-eyed and puzzled, and asked what the **** was going on. We cancelled our classes that day, but another faculty who had been at the student union told us he watched there. On one of the sofas in the TV room was a student taking a nap (not unusual). He woke up, watched awhile, then said his sister worked at the Pentagon and left to call his mother.
My most vivid memory is of the buildings falling. I simply could not comprehend what was happening. I didn’t have the experience of noticing no planes in the sky since that wasn’t a usual sight in the backwoods of Alabama. To this day I will think of the people on those planes and their loved ones.
I was standing at my desk and answered the phone. My friend Joy was crying and she said,”I am so glad you made me go up there. I didn’t want to go and you made me. I will always be grateful to you.” I had no idea what she was talking about. As she told me and I watched the news, I simply couldn’t believe it. Joy, my mother, another friend and I had enjoyed a glorious 4 days in the city several years earlier. Joy is afraid of heights and I had made her go to the top of WTC.
Once I could move from my desk, I went to my mother’s classroom where she taught high school gifted and talented students. This is in rural Central Texas. I don’t think any of them had ever been to NYC. I drew them maps of Manhattan, the bridges, the airports, etc. I told them the worst place to be at that moment would be a car headed into Manhattan in a tunnel. Nowhere to go. No lights. No radio. I still think that spot had to be one of the worst to be and still survive. Never did see or hear a news report on how those people stuck in the tunnel survived; learned what was going on, etc.
One of the students asked me how many people worked in the buildings. We did some quick calculations about how many people could have been in there at the time and we guessed 66,000. Two buildings of 110 floors each or 220 floors with 300 people per floor. That number really made us all numb. What if we had really lost them all? Working from that number backwards to the 3,000 we actually lost has always made me grateful it wasn’t any worse. That’s a sick way to look at it, I know, but it could have been so much worse.
Sorry to ramble.
44I was awakened by a friend calling to tell me to turn on the tv.
My daughter was still at home and sleeping (three hour time change in CA) Decided to keep her home because her high school, Beverly Hills High, is directly in the shadow of the Twin Towers in Century City and who knew what was going to happen next.
Watched all day in shock and horror like everyone else.
45Ok Rhea, you win: you got my waterworks with the note at the chapel in Boston…
46daChipster-We took our previous retired racing greyhound to Columbus more than a dozen times in 2012 and 2012 for osteosarcoma treatment at the OSU vet school. Later I’ll send you an email directly through JJ and we can talk more.
(Thanks everybody and please excuse us! We don’t want to hijack the comments!)
47I was teaching and didn’t really hear anything until about lunchtime. I had noticed several of my military kids had been signed out early and I remember asking in the office if there was something going on at the base. The secretary then told me bits and pieces. I watched the tv coverage for a couple minutes then had to pick up my class. I had to keep a brave face for the students but I was so frantic because my 4 year old son was at daycare and I just wanted to hug him tightly.
48I was an elementary school librarian. The school secretary came into the library and asked me to turn on the T.V. because she had heard on the radio that the WTC had been hit by a plane. I turned it on and we watched in horror. The principal came in and told us to turn it off because he didn’t want to get the kids upset.
We compromised by turning the T.V. towards the wall and turning off the sound. We watched it throughout the day whenever we had a chance. The principal was torn about telling the kids but decided that would be up to the parents, and staff were to say nothing about it.
When school was out for the day, he sat in the hall as parents came in and let them know that he had not informed their kids about the horrors of the day. He said that one father of a kindergartner grabbed his kid by the elbow and hustled him out, glaring at the principal as he did so and saying, “They bombed the World Trade Center!”
I’ve often wondered what in the world the five-year-old thought her dad was talking about.
49The image that is indelibly impressed on my brain of that day is the sight of my 12-year old son who happened to walk into the living room just as the falling towers appeared on the TV. I can’t know what he was thinking at that moment, but I wondered what kind of a world would be in his future. Earlier in the day I had commented to a co-worker, “And that nitwit is President.” I’ve come to loathe this day and how its meaning has been abused and manipulated.
50