22 years later

This morning I went to a diner. All the TVs were tuned to local news coverage at Ground Zero as family members read the names of the departed. At least one Maplewood resident, Douglas Cherry, was killed that day. I saw his name come up on the screen. 

A friend of ours lost his older brother. Years later a young woman joined my company. I found out later that she lost her dad that day when she was a teenager. 

I was lucky to not be directly affected in that way. I stood on top of the parking deck at Overlook Hospital and watched the smoke engulfing lower Manhattan. New York City radio stations were silenced, some briefly, and getting reliable news wasn’t easy. Among the other people on top of that parking deck was a woman who was telling everyone how every major building in DC was destroyed. It didn’t seem possible but it was hard to get information in those first few hours.

If you lost someone close that day, I’m sorry and you have my sympathy. I hope all those who were taken away early that morning are at peace. 

Two Maplewood residents died in the WTC attack.  Their names may be found on a plaque in front of a tree just south of the Maplewood Train Station building.  The tree was planted in their honor shortly after the attack.  There is a second local WTC memorial on the Springfield Avenue side of the Hilton Branch Library grounds.  That memorial includes a piece of metal from the WTC.  

Events of that day were chronicled here in MOL. @jamie, Have those threads been found and if so could you please post links?   

I wasn’t on social media of any kind, including MOL, at the time. I have heard that it’s a stunning record of how the events that day affected people locally. We were living in Maplewood at the time and lots of our neighbors went through some very harrowing experiences.