387 20 70359 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: On september 11th it was just a normal day at school and I was working on our morning work. All of a sudden James McAndrews came in yelling, "Hey everybody guess what! My sister is in New York and she saw the plane crash into the twin towers!" Of course know one knew what he was talking about, so we continued our work. Later on when our teacher got in from bus duty she had a class talk about it. I was thinking at the time, "Why is everybody making such a big deal out of a couple of buildings." Then I realized how many people died and what the Afganistanians did to our country. I realized the terror of what happened. Then the next night I couldn't sleep. In that next month all we did was talk with the class, grade, and school. In a way Im a tad bit happy they did that because they brought our country claoser togther as more of a nation. Now everone is caring more for people and families are talking with eachother. Even if it's a stranger now everyone has someone to lean on. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story6805.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-12 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 64.126.71.133 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: On the morning of Sept 11th 2001, a co-worker in my office heard that an airplane hit one of the towers at the World Trade Center. We all went to the room where the TV showed us one tower on fire and smoking. I know going through my mind was: How could an airplane NOT miss that tower! Of course, not long after the second plane hit the other tower and there was no denying we were under attack. The whole day was surreal ... the only times the phone rang at our office was when hospitals were calling to rent critical care equipment from our company. Allegiance Respiratory Care. They thought there would be a lot of injured people inundating their hospitals. Unfortunately, they were wrong, too few people came out of the towers alive. I think when the plane hit the Pentagon is when I really began to fear what was happening, and then there were unconfirmed reports of a plane down in Western PA. You had to wonder "what's next"? Our country has become stronger through this, with a renewed sense of pride and love for America. God Bless Us and Protect us from the intense hatred of the middle eastern people. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story2509.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-11 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 24.229.55.4 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: I had just dropped off my 3 kids at school and was listening to the radio in my kitchen when the DJ mentioned that a plane had struck the World Trade Center. I yelled to my husband to turn the T.V. on because I was sure it would be on the news, and as we both sat on the couch watching (our first thought was, wow, how could that poor guy flying the plane not see the Trade Center), then right before our eyes the second plane hit and I looked at my husband for some sort of explanation, and he said "oh, that was just debris from the other plane hitting the seond building". We finally realized that it was a second plane that hit, not debris and we both freaked. I was devastated. I couldn't move from the couch. I knew then that those buildings would come down, there was way too much damage to repair. For the rest of the day as well as the entire week, I was in s state of shock watching it over and over again on T.V. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story2955.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-11 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 205.188.209.38 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: TATUE OF LIBERTY"...and I felt so much emptiness...grief...loss... Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story4919.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-11 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 209.240.198.62 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: About a month after the attack, I began keeping a journal. Following is the entry for September 11th. On Tuesday, September 11, 2001, the World Trade Center in New York City was attacked by terrorists. More than a month later, the wreckage, which the rescue workers referred to as ?The Pile?, was still burning! The buildings withstood the impact of two commercial airplanes, but the fire was so intense (2000 degrees) it melted the steel structure, which caused the buildings to implode. Over 3,000 people from 80 nations perished. Everyday since then, I have replayed in my mind moments of that day over-and-over again. I believe the reason I am still replaying it is that I don't ever want to forget that day. I don't want anyone to ever forget how terrorizing and devastating this attack was for thousands of people and the intensity of emotions, disbelief and sorrow that were felt. I think it's important to record my personal impressions of that fateful day and I am hoping that by writing this essay, I will be able to "turn off" the videotape in my mind. A vicious attack was perpetrated on American soil. More people died on 9/11/01 than any other single day in American history. More people died this day than at Pearl Harbor, more than one year during the Vietnam War. It is too much to comprehend. Tuesday, September 11th: The morning of September 11 was sunny and warm, a beautiful day. I left later than usual for the office in Midtown Manhattan. Mom needed some assistance that morning and when I left her apartment I was about 30 minutes off schedule. When I got on the subway, as usual I stood against the door, facing the window on the No. 7 Train. As we approached Queensboro Plaza in Long Island City, I could see the Manhattan skyline. Looking south, I noticed the World Trade Center was on fire, I said to the guy standing next to me -- "There's a fire in the WTC! It looks as if a plane has crashed into it!" From my vantage-point, the facade of the building looked broken. I immediately said a prayer for the people inside the building, the firemen who would arrive to rescue them and the people below who might be injured or killed by falling debris. When I got to the office, on my way to the 23 Floor, a young man in the elevator told me his wife had just called him on his cell phone to say a plane crashed into the WTC. I thought to myself, I was right. I told him I saw the building burning. Still thinking this was a tragic accident I continued on to my desk. Events of the day occurred very quickly after I arrived at work. My manager coordinated the effort with the senior managers of each division to determine if all of our sales and service personnel were accounted for. It wasn't long after I arrived that I realized the young man in the elevator was talking about the 2nd plane crash not the 1st. Only now was it clear to me, this was not an accident. We had been attacked! Fear surged through my body, but I was not panicked. I tried to remain calm. One of our employees had a small television in the office so we were able to get up-to-the-minute news. I couldn't bring myself to look at the television. I was told that people were holding hands and jumping out of windows from 100 stories above. The intensity of the fire was so great; they saw that as their only way out. Shortly after this, we heard that NYC was in a state of emergency, a total lockdown -- all NYC airports, bridges, and tunnels - everything came to a halt. I couldn't keep up with the phone calls. I was answering so many phones; I couldn't make any outgoing calls. One of my co-workers came to me and told me I better go over to one of the AA's who was very upset so I ran over to console her. At the same time, my sister Jane (who also works for the same company) came to tell me that our sister Anne was not at work and there was a possibility she may be at the WTC on a job interview. She had been on an interview at the WTC the Friday before and it was possible she was on a second interview. I told Jane I couldn't even allow myself to think about that -- it terrified me. I told her that Anne would be fine. Telephone communication began to deteriorate. It was difficult calling out especially to cell phones. The next announcement we heard was that the Pentagon was attacked. Our nation's entire air traffic system was shut down. All flights were cancelled until further notice. Only President Bush, in Air Force One was allowed to fly. I said out loud "This is War!" I will remember the following moment, as though it was yesterday, for as long as I live. A co-worker came over to my desk and told me that one of the towers just collapsed. In my mind I could see myself standing on my mother's terrace, looking at the Manhattan skyline and seeing only one tower standing. I imagined all of the people in the building, the staircases crumbling beneath them, free-falling to their deaths. I had the sensation, which I have experienced in a dream that I was falling; only I wasn't dreaming I was awake. I couldn't breathe; I gasped for air and wept uncontrollably. I remember saying "Oh my God all the people, how can someone hate so much!" Two co-workers came over to console me. I knew I had to regain my composure. It was around this time, after the first tower went down, that Jane called me to say that our sister Anne was safe and at home. I said a prayer of thanksgiving, but now I was shaking inside. Less than 30 minutes later, the nightmare got worse when the North Tower of the World Trade Center collapsed. A few minutes after, we heard that another plane, believed to be headed for the White House or Capitol buildings had crashed in Pennsylvania. God Help Us All! Employees were congregating in my work area. Everyone wanted to know what to do. Everyone was scared and wanted to go home, but remained calm. We communicated to all personnel by voice mail and e-mail that if it was possible to get home; they were free to go as long as each person notified their manager that they were leaving, and called to say that they had arrived home. Employees were stationed at the lobby of each floor to record who was leaving for the day. Mayor Rudolph Giuliani ordered the evacuation of Lower Manhattan at about 11:00 AM. Once we heard the bridges were open to pedestrians, Jane and I along with two co-workers decided not to wait until subway service resumed. We decided to walk home together. On our way uptown, we stopped at a store along the way so that two of us could buy sneakers for the 2+-mile journey ? we weren?t the only ones, many women were buying sneakers to replace their high heels. There were thousands of people evacuating the city and yet it was eerily quiet, except for the sirens of rescue vehicles on the way to the scene. Even the sound of car horns was absent. Everyone was calm, polite and focused and lent a helping hand to anyone in need. The four of us continued up Lexington Avenue and over the 59 Street Bridge, encouraging each other along the way and trying to allay each other?s fears. I'm so glad the four of us were together and able to calmly make our way home. It was on the 59 Street Bridge that we got our first look at the World Trade Center. It was a brilliant sunny day and all that could be seen was smoke and dust clouds covering lower Manhattan. Devastating. Although none of us said anything at the time, I think for an instant we all thought the same thing, "What if they were to bomb the bridges?" I couldn't let myself dwell on that. When we reached the apex of the bridge we could see thousands of people ahead of us. It looked like the Verrazzano Bridge the morning of the New York City Marathon. We left the office at about 12:30 PM and were over the bridge by 1:30 PM. We said farewell to one of the ladies at Queensboro Plaza. She continued on to her home in Long Island City. She told me later that people had set up tables outside their homes and offered water to everyone passing by. We continued on to Queens Boulevard. We had another 2 miles to go. Along the way, we met 2 other people from our company. At about 40 Street and Queens Boulevard, the MTA had set up a staging area of buses to transport people out of the area and down Queens Boulevard as quickly as possible. Jane and I were not interested in getting on a bus. The other ladies just missed getting on one, but things worked out for them. A pick up truck was stopped at a light. A young man asked the woman in the passenger seat if a few people could get in the back. The driver agreed so our co-workers, along with about 10 other people, climbed into the pick up truck. There they were standing in the back of the truck and as it pulled away, it reminded me of how ?the Press? precedes a parade with cameras ready. They were well on their way to getting home safe. As Jane and I walked along Queens Boulevard, we heard planes overhead. Knowing full well that all planes were grounded, this was not a comforting feeling. Someone ahead of us said they were Fighter Jets. I couldn't believe it. My home -- Fighter Jets -- NYC -- World Trade Center Collapsed -- War -- Thousands Dead. It was surreal. I didn't want to look at them for fear I would see them in pursuit of another plane. I had missed witnessing the first plane crash into the North Tower by seconds and if they were in pursuit of a plane, I did not want to be an eyewitness. Thank God they were just patrolling the area. The city was on Full Alert. It was a day or two later that we learned Fighter Jets were only 8 minutes away from New York City prepared to intercept the hijacked planes. There just wasn?t enough time. We arrived at Mom's at about 3:00 -3:30 PM. Mom was home and listening to the news on the radio. She and Jane embraced. It was good to be home. Michael, our brother, had driven home safely from the city; Anne and our nephew Thomas joined us as well. The first thing I did was to go out onto the terrace to see the skyline. Thick, dark, acrid smoke covered lower Manhattan. We sat and watched the news. I could not believe my eyes. I watched the 2nd plane attack, I thought to myself -- my God, what had the passengers thought when their plane was hijacked? ? what had the workers in the building thought when they saw the plane coming towards them? The absolute horror and terror imposed on them broke my heart. We saw the people above the fires hanging out the windows waving white clothes to signal distress -- then in desperation, holding hands and jumping to their deaths. I watched the collapse of the towers, the tsunami cloud of dust and debris which caused people to run for their lives, the look of fear on their faces, people tripping and being helped up, young students so frightened, tears streaming down their faces, being escorted by their teachers to safety. I still was not able to grasp the enormity of this event. Regular programming on television was pre-empted. All networks and cable channels were providing 24-hour coverage. The whole world was watching the coverage of this deliberate, premeditated, evil attack on innocent men, women and children. As we watched the news, we shared our stories. - Jane spent the morning calling to make sure all of our family members were safe. She called our brother in Maryland to find out whether our sister-in-law Miguela worked in the vicinity of the Pentagon and if she was safe. Our nephew Tim answered the phone. They were not aware of what was happening until Jane told them to put on the television. Jane also called our sister Anne at work. That?s when she realized there was a chance she might be on a second interview at 2 WTC. Jane assisted in accounting for the employees who work downtown. She was in touch with her good friend when the buildings were collapsing. Her friend was on the main concourse of the WTC and heard the first plane hit the north tower. At first, she took shelter in the Border?s bookstore in the lobby of the Trade Center. She saw the 2nd plane hit the south tower and knew she had to get out of there. While she was running uptown, she fell and hurt herself. She did not think she was going to live. She made it to an office at 11 Park Place. Jane told her to get out of there and get as far away as she could from downtown. Thankfully, she escaped. - Thomas saw the first tower collapse from his classroom window. Something a 17-year-old should never have to witness. The teachers tried to maintain normalcy, they drew the shades and continued with their lessons. One of Thomas? classmates was called to the principal?s office. His mother worked at the Trade Center. She did not come home. Thomas? father, Harry, picked him up from school on his way home from the Upper Eastside of Manhattan. Harry also walked over the 59 Street Bridge. - Michael was on the 59 St Bridge, driving to work, talking to his boss on his cell phone. As he was driving, he witnessed the second plane crash and a ball of fire explode from the center of the South tower. - We have 2 cousins that worked in the area. One escaped by running north and east (as he ran north, the thought occurred to him - What if they hit the Empire State Building next?) and the other by running to Brooklyn. - Anne had been at a doctor's appointment. When she got home and entered her apartment building, a neighbor asked her if she had heard about the World Trade Center. Anne said no and went upstairs. From her terrace, she could see a cloud of smoke behind the North tower. It looked as though one tower was gone, but that couldn't be she thought to herself. She went next door to her neighbor to find out what was going on. He told her one of the towers did collapse. His phone rang. While he was talking on the phone, Anne saw the North tower collapse. She went back to her apartment, out onto the terrace, got on her knees and prayed. We could not stop watching the news coverage. No matter how many times I saw the collapse, I couldn't believe it. We listened to Mayor Giuliani?s press conference. He advised everyone in the city to treat Wednesday as we would a ?snow? day. Only essential personnel should enter the city. When asked about the number of people that may be hurt or dead, he replied that the number "would be more than any of us can bear". It was already known that over 300 firefighters and police officers were lost. They had arrived on the scene before the 2nd tower was hit and had entered both towers to assist in a rescue effort. Mayor Giuliani asked that everyone remain calm and stay home with their children and families. We remained at Mom's until President George W. Bush addressed the nation that evening. He informed us that evidence was pointing in the direction of Osama Bin Laden of Afghanistan as the person responsible. Battleships and aircraft carriers were on their way to protect the East Coast of the United States of America. He assured us that we were a nation united and we would hunt down and punish those responsible. After his address, we each went home grateful we were not one of the thousands of families still waiting for word of a loved one. Were they in hospital, did they make it out, did they suffer, did they know how much they were loved, who were they with, where were they? Waiting, waiting, waiting. A pall had been cast upon this great city. Even the birds left us for a few days. The silence was painful. Pray for Peace God Bless America WE WILL NEVER FORGET Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story964.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-08-02 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 64.12.96.206 Annotation Annotations to this item. Struggle to get home Students/Teachers WTC, attack Politics and politicians NY:3 October, 2001 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: hi my name is lauren and im from texas. the morning of september 11 was a normal morning i got up at six ate breakfast and then ran upthe street for my ride to school. We arrived at school at 7, ready to start dance practice. that friday was our 70's peprally, so we were dancing along to love shack. then, at 8 mr zepada one of our APs came on the announcement and said, "due to the recent tragedy in new york if all teachers could turn off their televisions untill further notified. Becasue we ariived before and were not allowed to listen to the radio, we had no clue what was going on. Immediately my mind raced to what the "tragedy" could possible be. The president was assasinated, another school shooting, someone else famous was assasinated. I had no clue. During this time our director called the office to see what the caious was all about. after abotu 30 minutes she returned, though something was different. She seemed shocked almost like maybe she had seen a ghost or something. we danced for another 30 minutes and then called circle. After telling announcements, giving compliments , and planning for the next day, our director finally todl us waht had happened. She said that two american airline jets had hit the world trade center towers. my mouth dropped. i coudltn believe it. i dont know how anyone coudl belive it. just that past year before i had performed int he macys parade, and had the cance to go into the world trade centers and see the view from the top floor. I was in complete shock i thoguht maybe it was a sick joke, but it wasnt. throughout the day none of the teachers obbayed the AP every single television was on. We walked like mummys to and from all of oru classes. you woudl walk in watch the televesion and then walk out.after school i immeidately went home adn turned the tv on. i sat there for 3 hours. i coudlnt belive that somehting soo magnificent could be gone in seconds. most kids in my school have never been to new york and dont really know the greatness of the towers i on the other hand spent 2 hours in amazement jsut making my own tour throughout the buildings. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story4210.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-11 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 206.77.47.2 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: While at work , I heard the news. I could not believe it. I am from Washington D.C. and have family there. I had visited them that weekend and returned on Sunday out of the same airport.Devastating. My prayers began that day for those families and have not stopped.I went home and held my husband and baby tighter. Felicia Pharagood-Wade Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story6061.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-12 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 158.111.4.25 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: First i must say, To the men and women who fight for this country Thank you and to the workers who helped at Ground Zero, you are all heros! The morning of 9/11 i woke up early, before my alarm went off(which i never do). My mom had left the t.v. on when she left for work. I went in to her room to shut the t.v. off when i saw the first tower get hit, i remeber dropping to the floor in shock, when the second tower was hit i just started balling!!! I began calling my dad who works for a government agency. His partner did not know where he was(my dad lives in maryland and drives thru states to get to work)i told him as soon as he found him to tell my dad to call me. I then called my best friend, she's a flight attendant i wanted to make sure she was ok! She wasen't flying that day, sadly others did.She said she was fine, and she would call me later. i jumped in my car and headed to school in my pj's. on the way i kept calling my dad's office, finally my dad's partner again answered the phone and informed me that the building had been evacuated. i asked him if this was so why was he still their, his answer he was taking care of unfinished buisness i told him to get out now(he listened!). i recieved a call from my dad about an hour later he was fine but the shock and terror of what happen had hit us both bad. i asked him if we were going to war, who was behind it, are we safe. Every question i could think of i asked. he said he could'nt tell me he was as clueless as the next at this point. i called my brother after talking to my dad (my brother was in chicago) he said they had evacuated his college and all of downtown chicago. Every once in a while i think of the terroist who preformed this cowardly act and i become more angry. Now more then ever i feel as if i have to do something to protect myself my family and this country that allows us to be so free. I was never one to support the military forces i didn't agree with war at one point. But now more then ever i find myself wanting to join and help in any way possible so our future children do not see or feel what we have felt over this last year. I truely honor the men and women who were involved with the protection of this country and those who volunteered to go in to burning buildings and rumage through the broken steel. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story6661.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-12 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 198.81.16.29 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: Why did the worst day of our lives start out so nice? Weather-wise, September 11th was beautiful. It was one of those days that you picture them having all the time in California. There literally was not a cloud in the sky. The weather man was promising a high of around 80 degrees. That day happened to be a ?suit day?. One day a week I used to wear a suit. Since we are allowed to dress down at Empire, I needed an excuse to get my nice clothes out of the closet so they wouldn?t get all dusty. And there?s no better way to tell if you?re getting fat than by wearing a suit on a regular basis. They don?t lie. So one day a week I would wear a suit. Now when it was warm, I wouldn?t really wear a full suit. Everything but the jacket. I really wish I wore a pair of sneakers that day. I walked down to the subway at about 8:00. As usual I walked along the waterfront. This isn?t necessary on Roosevelt Island. One can just as easily walk down Main St in the middle of the island. However the view of the city would be blocked most of the way down. Or one can be really lazy and take the bus for all of 2 minutes. But I really like to take advantage of where I live. So when I walked to the subway, I would walk along the river. The view of the Manhattan skyline is awesome. You get the Empire State Building, the Queensboro Bridge, the UN?and the World Trade Center. Little did I know that this would be the last time I would see it from Roosevelt Island. I got on the 6th Ave. Shuttle that runs from here. I took that to W. 4th St. where I then switched trains. From W. 4th St., I had my choice. I could take the A, C or E trains. The preferred train was the E because it brought you closest to the mall underneath the World Trade Center. But if the A or C came first, I would take one of those. They dropped you closer to Chambers St. and added about 2 minutes of walking. Almost 90% of the time, the E-train would come first. However, that morning nothing came for about 5 minutes. That may not seem like much time but on a New York subway platform, it can mean the difference between being alone or sharing the platform with a couple thousand people. Finally an A train came. Little did I know that train and the otherwise annoying delay saved my life. I was one of the last people to cram into the door. I was probably viewed as one of those jerks that squeezes on when there?s no room. But that morning I didn?t care. (Do jerks ever care?) I got off at Chambers St. and began the long walk to One World Trade Center. I walked through the underground mall just like I would do any other day. Between the mall and the lobby of Tower One, there is a bank of about 15 glass revolving doors. They are each separated by concrete columns that are the base of the columns that went all the way up the side of the building. The last thing I remember before the world changed forever was that I was thinking how empty the mall was. I was about 50 feet from the revolving doors when all of a sudden the lights went out for a second and came back on. I quickly glanced over at a cop in front of Banana Republic who looked up and reacted the same way I did. It?s not something you see every day but probably nothing to be alarmed about. What I saw next happened so quickly I barely had time to react. I noticed that the lobby of Tower One almost instantly filled up with a rolling brown cloud from floor to ceiling. I stopped walking when all of a sudden ? BOOM ? the entire lobby exploded. The revolving doors in front of me just vaporized. Amazingly nothing hit me. There was a second of silence as everyone started to comprehend what happened. And then the all the running and screaming started. I have never run so fast in my life. Working in that building we had always known that if terrorists ever came back to the World Trade Center, they were going to finish what they started. So even though I was running away, I was convinced I wasn?t going to make it out of the mall alive. As we all started to run, a lady next to me fell down. I stopped to help her but she got up on her own. So I continued to run. I reached a point where I had to make a choice. The mall formed a ?T?. I could make a left and go up an escalator to the street. But I knew in the panic people were probably getting trampled there. I could make a right and go up another set of stairs about 300 yards away. But if there was a larger explosion coming or we were breathing something chemical or biological, I could die before I made it there. So I ran straight ahead into the N/R subway station. I was about to run down the stairs to the Uptown platform (where I knew I could get out to the street) when I ran into a crowd of people coming up the stairs. They were just frozen with terror in their eyes. I yelled to all of them, ?The lobby to One World Trade Center just exploded! Turn around! Get the hell out of here now!? Somebody asked me ?Was it a bomb?? I told them ?I don?t know. Just get out of here!? Some people didn?t even hesitate and turned and ran. Other people just stood there in disbelief. I yelled at them again ?Turn around! Run!? I got to the bottom of the stairs where there was an underpass to go to the Uptown platform. There were more people down there asking me ?What?s going on?? I told them the situation too and told them to turn around and run. Somehow I appeared like the expert of the situation because some lady pointed to a flight of stairs to our right and asked me ?Does this go up to the street?? I don?t know what the hell I was thinking because I said ?Yeah, I think so.? I started running up the stairs and everybody followed me. I won?t tell you the expletive I screamed when I got to the top of the stairs and realized that this was no exit. At the top of those stairs you have a choice, the Downtown subway platform or the mall. I think everyone lost faith in me because they actually started heading back into the mall. By this time smoke was starting to pour into the station. There was no way I was going back into that mall there, but I knew there was another exit down at the south end of the platform. So I pulled out my Metro Card, swiped it at the turnstile and got onto the platform. Only one person followed me. That was the lady that asked me if the stairs went to the street. We ran down to the exit at the south end of the platform. The only way out was to go back into the mall but it was right by stairs to the street. So we ran into the mall, up the stairs and out on to the street. I really didn?t know what to expect when I got outside. When I did, the sky was black. There were burning pieces of paper, soot and debris coming down all over. I continued to run until I got across the street to a little park at the southeast corner of the World Trade Center complex. And then I looked up at the horror. At the top of Tower One were four or five floors completely engulfed in flames. Pieces of the building were falling off. There were more sirens than I had ever heard in my entire life. I was totally out of breath and shaking uncontrollably. I had never come so close to getting killed in my life. Just then I felt my cell phone vibrating like I had a message. I took it out of my pocket and could barely hold it in my hand. It was even more difficult to dial because of the shaking. It was a message from my brother Geoff saying he heard on the radio that a small plane had hit the building. It?s amazing that they got the story on the radio that quick. But it was obvious that it wasn?t too accurate yet because his message did not reflect what I was seeing unfold before my eyes. From his description I was standing there thinking ?Oh my God. He doesn?t even realize how serious this is.? So I tried to call him back. No luck. I tried my mother and then my father and then Geoff . Again no luck. I kept calling them over and over and over again but could not get any of the calls to go through. Finally I lucked out. The phone was ringing at my father?s and then it went into voice-mail. Since he has the same voice-mail service I have, I knew it meant that he was on the phone probably trying to call me. So I left him a message. I don?t even remember what I said but I remember explaining how the lobby exploded just as I was about to go through the doors, telling him that I didn?t know when I would be able to talk to him again and asking him to spread the word that I was alive and OK. As I hung up the phone, I heard people screaming around me. They were pointing up at the building and crying. I asked a guy next to me what was going on. I could see the fire raging at somewhere around the 90th floor of Tower One and pieces of the building continuing to fall. And this guy told me, ?Look, those are people.? It was absolutely horrible. Some people appeared to still be alive and conscious as they were jumping. Others just fell lifelessly. One guy was in a suit and his body was falling parallel to the ground with his tie pointing straight up in the air. These were just regular people like you and me who went to work one day. And died a horrible death. I really wanted to get in touch with my mother. But it was pretty obvious that the cell phone network was down. I remembered that my brother Gerald worked a block away but I couldn?t remember his number. I decided I would go to his building and see if I could find him. Then I could call my mother on his phone. As I turned to walk away I heard a sound I will never be able to get out of my head. I could hear the sound of jet engines. It?s nothing you would normally think twice about as it?s just another loud sound you hear in New York. But not that loud and not in Lower Manhattan. The engines were screaming like they were being pushed to full throttle. I turned to look up at Tower Two and watched as the second jet plowed into the building about halfway up. A tremendous fireball shot out the side of the building as we instantly got hit with an intense blast of heat down on the street. The thought going through my head was ?So this is what it?s like to die.? Pieces of the building and the jet were coming down everywhere. Everyone standing in the crowd that a moment ago was almost shoulder to shoulder had now turned screaming and running for their lives. As I turned and ran towards Broadway I was just waiting for something to hit me in the back. I saw to my right that people were getting trampled when all of a sudden the person in front of me fell down. The rush of the crowd immediately pushed me down on top of him. And everyone behind fell on top of me. We were all struggling to get up as the masses ran around us. Somehow I got out of the pile and ran across Broadway. Cars were driving through red lights but we weren?t stopping either. I would rather take my chances getting hit by a car then getting crushed by a chunk of concrete from 80 stories up. I ran across Broadway and made a left on a small side street to hide behind a building. When it was clear that nothing else was coming down, I got out and walked down the street east. Who knew whether there were any more jets coming. It was then I decided to get out of Lower Manhattan. As I was walking, some guy must have seen me all out of breath and covered with soot. He asked me what happened. It was pretty clear that many people just a few blocks away had no idea. I told him about the lobby and seeing the jet hit Tower Two. He said ?You should call your family.? I told him ?I?ve been trying. My cell phone isn?t working.? He said ?Why don?t you come into my building. You can use a phone there.? The people in the lobby of the building were nice enough to let me use the phone at the reception desk. I called my mother. I told her my story quickly and said I was getting the hell out of Lower Manhattan. When I hung up, I noticed that everyone in the lobby was listening to me. I thanked the security guards and went on my way. By the time I got to Water St. on the East Side, the streets were packed. It seemed as if every building had emptied out and nobody knew what to do or where to go. As I walked along, I overheard a group of strangers talking to each other trying to figure out what was going on. I heard one of them say ?I heard a plane hit one of the towers.? I corrected him and said ?A plane hit both towers.? One woman asked ?One plane flew into both towers?? I said ?No. Two planes. One into each tower.? She asked ?How do you know this?? I told her ?I was there. I was just about to walk into Tower One when the lobby exploded. I was standing across the street from Tower Two when another jet hit that one. It?s really bad.? I really didn?t want to stick around and chat. I was determined to get away from any tall buildings. It was at that point that I realized I was extremely thirsty. I mean the most thirsty I had ever been in my life. I decided to make a pit stop over at South St. Seaport to get some water. There weren?t any tall buildings that close to it so I figured I was relatively safe. As I walked in I noticed the bars were already open. People were there getting drunk. The temptation was overwhelming. I stayed in control and got a bottle of water. Then I started to walk uptown again. As I was walking through the streets above the Seaport, I noticed that anybody with a car parked had the doors open with 1010 WINS playing loud enough for everyone to hear. There were crowds around each car. I couldn?t believe what I heard. They were commercial jets that flew into the towers. When I saw the plane hit Tower Two, I really thought it was something like a Lear jet. Looking back later I realized that those towers were so big, it made any jet look small in comparison. Plus I had never seen a jumbo jet fly that fast. But to think that there were actually innocent passengers on those planes was just too horrible to comprehend. I got back over to Water St. and continued walking north. When I got to the Brooklyn Bridge, there was a woman standing out in the street directing traffic. People were still driving through red lights everywhere but at least this lady was trying to get things back in control. I then realized that she was an off-duty cop. I was about to cross the street in front of an entrance ramp to the Brooklyn Bridge when she yelled over to me and the other pedestrians to stop. I figured it was probably a good idea and did just that. But the crowd around me continued. So I wasn?t going to stand there like an idiot and watch them. So I crossed too. And she yelled at the crowd ?I told you to stop!? Nobody listened. It was near anarchy. I later heard some guy behind me mention to his friend that the crowd stopped when she motioned for her gun. When I crossed the street again just north of the Brooklyn Bridge, I noticed that there was a clear view of both towers. I decided to stop and watch with the crowd that had gathered there. Not only were we watching history, but I wanted to watch the fire department put the fires out. Those were my buildings and I would have stood there all day at that point to watch them put them out. Tower One was still engulfed. It looked like 4 or 5 floors were burning at a time and the fire just continued to move up the building. Tower Two only looked like there were maybe one or two floors burning. And it really looked like they were making progress in putting it out. From the northeast corner of that tower, it looked like there was fire literally ?pouring? out of the building. Almost as if somebody was welding. My friend Patrick days later explained to me that it was probably molten steel from the support beams. I started talking to this guy next to me. I was the only person in that crowd who was anywhere near the World Trade Center when everything happened. I started to tell him my story. I never got a chance to finish. I was talking to him when all of a sudden his jaw dropped. I turned to look as Tower Two started to lean toward the east. And then the whole thing went straight down. We were about five blocks away but the noise was deafening. When the building hit the ground, it was the loudest, most horrible sound I had ever heard. We were standing there literally watching thousands of people die in front of our eyes. The crowd screamed. A woman next to me fell to the ground and curled up in a ball crying. Her friends tried to pick her up but she wouldn?t move. This was a horror worse than anybody could have imagined. I really thought I was watching the beginning of the end of the world. The World Trade Center had stood at that spot since I was a little kid. And like everyone else, I was convinced those towers would stand there long after I was gone. I was wrong. I turned away and started crying. But all of a sudden shock kicked in and shut off all emotion. It was like a switch went off and said ?You have to survive and this isn?t helping.? Then I saw the dust cloud about 30 stories tall squeezing down every street in Lower Manhattan. I knew that anybody in the path of that thing was probably going to suffocate. And then I saw it come around the corner at the base of the Brooklyn Bridge and start heading towards us. It was time to run again. I was ready to take off my shirt and cover my mouth with it when I noticed the cloud wasn?t as thick as it once was. So I stopped running. The wind was blowing southeast and we were northeast of the World Trade Center. So we got spared the brunt of it. At this point I was really in shock. I had seen more horrible stuff in an hour than the vast majority of people in the world would ever see in their lifetimes. The world as we knew it was over. And I just couldn?t feel anything anymore. I walked uptown along the service road of the FDR. There were just people everywhere. I didn?t even look up as I walked. I was all alone and for all I knew, I might not even make it to the end of the day. For all I knew, all my friends were dead. I had no way of getting in touch with anyone. I just wanted to crawl into a cave and die. But dying wasn?t an option so I kept going. I continued to walk and walk and walk without paying much attention to where I was. All of a sudden I heard somebody say ?Hey, when are those servers coming back up?? And I looked up and saw my friend John smiling with about 10 of my co-workers waiting for a pay phone. I almost knocked these guys over when I ran into them. It was truly the happiest moment of my life. Words can?t describe what it was like to see a group of familiar faces after going through all that horror. I was no longer alone. I was in a group of friends and we were going to get through this together. We continued to walk along the FDR Drive. We could have walked into the streets in the center of Manhattan but there were just more targets there. So we figured we should stay on the outskirts along the FDR Drive as long as possible. We finally got to somewhere in the 20?s and decided to walk in. It seemed like the entire city was either in a car or on foot. I don?t know why anybody bothered to drive. Besides the emergency lanes that were set up, nothing was moving. The sidewalks were packed but at least people could move there. Once we got to Midtown, we all started to separate. I stayed with John and another co-worker, Kathy. They each had to get to Grand Central which was on my way so I figured I would walk them there. I told them that if the trains weren?t running, they could come up and stay at my apartment. It was at that point that Kathy remembered her sister lived on 36th St. We decided to head over there to at least take a rest and figure out what we were going to do. We had no idea what to expect at this point. How much were our lives about to change? Was there going to be a run on the banks? Empty supermarket shelves? Martial law, etc.? As silly as it sounds now, these really seemed like real possibilities. We were in luck as Kathy?s sister and her boyfriend were home. We got to rest our feet and watch TV. We found out that Tower One had collapsed shortly after Tower Two. (I remembered that we had heard rumbling earlier on the FDR Drive and had no idea what it was.) And at that time it really hit home hard what had happened. We were watching Channel 2 and all along at the bottom of the screen it said ?World Trade Center Attacked and Destroyed?. I couldn?t believe the words I was reading. I mean we weren?t a military target. We weren?t an aircraft carrier or anything like that. We were an office building filled with innocent people. Why did we deserve this? After sitting at Kathy?s sisters for a while, I decided to press on. I wanted to make it home no matter what it took. I knew that the subway wasn?t running and the Roosevelt Island Tram probably wasn?t running either. So I knew that I was probably going to have to walk the whole way home. But I didn?t care. I had to get there. Kathy?s sister and her boyfriend (whose names I will someday remember) offered to let me sleep on their couch if I couldn?t make it home. That was really nice because I had never met these people before in my life. I thanked them and told them I might take them up on the offer. When I got to the Tram, of course it was closed. But I looked across Second Ave. and saw that they had opened the lower level of the Queensboro Bridge to pedestrian traffic. To get to Roosevelt Island, I was going to have to go to Queens. So I joined the crowd on the bridge. At this point, I really started to feel the blisters on my feet. They were hurting so bad, I was limping. I didn?t care. My goal was to make it home. As we walked across the bridge, every few minutes you could hear a fighter jet overhead. The sky was completely empty except for them. When I looked to my right toward Lower Manhattan, giant white plumes of smoke were blowing over Brooklyn. The World Trade Center was gone and in it?s place was a giant fire and death at an unimaginable scale. And as I saw the mass of refugees crossing the bridge and the destruction in the background, I just couldn?t believe what I was looking at. This was something we had seen in newspapers and on TV out entire lives going on in other countries around the world. People escaping from war, misery. And today September 11, 2001, the invisible shield which protected us from all the evil things that went on in other places around the globe was gone. War had come to New York City. And nobody even saw it coming. After a long, arduous journey of 7 hours, I made it home. My feet were bleeding as the blisters that were there were rubbed off. I never thought my apartment would look this good. As I began to return all the phone calls I got, I realized what a lucky person I was. Twice today, I thought I was dead. But I made it. And all of my closest friends at Empire had lived. And nothing else mattered more than that. I came to find out in later days that we lost 11 people at Empire and my cousin Chris who worked at Cantor Fitzgerald. And to this day, I cannot figure out how the deaths of these innocent people made sense to some jerk on the other side of the earth who never met them before. They were just numbers. It?s all incomprehensible how evil people can be in the name of their God. But once again the United States is faced with an attack by fanatics. And just like in earlier wars, we are going to do what we have to do to defend ourselves. But with the rose-colored glasses we wore in the 90?s, who ever thought that we would be involved in something like this again? Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story935.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-07-25 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 216.5.154.160 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: I was in school, and it was 1st period. The incident had already happened, but I didn't know all of the details because I left for school before the Towers were struck. There were so many different stories floating around the school, and throughout the 2,400 students that I wasn't sure which ones to believe. I was immediatly concerned that it was Continental Airlines. This worried me because a close family friends is a piolet for them. I didn't have a cell phone at the time, but wanted to call him or my mom to find out if he was okay, and if it was that airline at all. Luckly, one of my fellow classmates had a cell phone that could connect to the internet. She did so and found out a few more facts. It was concluded that it wasn't Continental Airlines at all. It took everyone quite a long time to realize that not all the information that we were being told was going to be true, or accurate. The principle came over the intercom and announced that the teachers were not to allow the televisions to be turned on to view the news. We, the students, got around that rule by listening to the raido or calling our parents during the class change times. When I got home from school all I did was sit infront of the TV and try to figure out what exactally had happened. It was really hard for me, im sure as well as others too, to grasp the concept that there no longer stood the Twin Towers and that the Pentagon was also struck. In addition, there was a 4th plane that crashed in Philidelphia. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story4192.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-11 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 206.77.47.2 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: I had spent the night at my boy friends house. I always slept in, but he woke me up early and told me to turn on the tv. I couldnt believe what I saw. I thought at first that it was just a movie, but it wasn't. I guess it hadnt hit me yet while he was driving me to school. Then on the radio it told of a plane that had crashed in Penn. that was flying out of Newark, N.J. It was then that I realized my dad was supposed to be flying from Newark that day. I started balling my eyes out. My boy friend rushed me to my dorm, parked illegally and practically carried me to my 6th floor dorm room. I couldnt even think straight, so many things came to my mind...could that have been my dad's plane. I walked into my room and my roommate and her boy friend were there. I told them about my dad and the plane. She gave me a phone card to call my mom in West Palm. Amazingly I got through on the first try. I couldnt even ask her if my dad was ok or if she had heard anything, I just cried and blurted out "dad". She calmed me down and told me that she had heard from him and that he was at my grandparents house in New Jersey. His flight had been cancelled, obviously. He had a friend that owned a rental car place, he was going to pick up a car and drive down some back roads to Florida as soon as he was able to. She said she would have him call me when he got home. About a week later I was sitting at my desk working on some homework for an anthropology class and the phone rings. It was my dad! I have never been so relieved to hear his voice, I just cried and told him I loved him. For a few moments I shared the feeling with so other Americans of the uncertainty of not knowing what had happend to a loved one. It's scary, knowing that they might be gone, and you didnt get a chance to say good bye. I was lucky, my dad was ok. But there are too many people out there that were not as lucky as me...my heart and prayers go out to all of them. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story11273.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2005-01-27 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 128.186.159.16 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: Im bad with dates, I dont even know what today is- but I can never forget that tuesday. I was on my way to work in Mid-town when the D train stopped running and made everyone get out at 59th Columbus Circle on the west side. I was running late and this was the last thing I needed, and the conductors never tell you why the service has stopped so needless to say I (along with the rest of the early rush commute) was highly annoyed. Walking east five avenues just made me more mad baecause it was impossible to get a cab. You see I havent heard what had happened yet. Finally getting to the 46th floor of the building where I work, exiting the elevator and entering the all glass reception area, I was perplexed to see virtually the entire floor gathered at the window that faced south. The radio was turned on and blasting 1010 WINS news radio and I saw a small cloud of smoke from one of the towers. So it was a fire all the way downtown that stopped the trains...great that figures. At that moment of seeing what was the focus of everyone's attention suddenly a plane disappeared into the other tower. I thoguht its not a fire, we're at war, someone is bombing us! I've got to get on the phone and get out of here. Now! I ran into my office with windows that face the towers and in a mechanical manner started dailing my boyfriends cell phone. He works in the south tower. No answer. I try my good friend who works at the FBI headquarters near the towers. No answer. I call my sister who works a few blocks from me. An answer. Working in a doctors office with no windows or radio, she hasnt heard about the news and whats going on. I tell her we've got to go home & Im on my way to her office. In tears I franticly retry my boyfriend's number remembering how hatefull I have been to him lately. At this point the tower falls. The dust cloud looks like an atom bomb went off. It starts creeping uptown like a warning pushing me out the office to go home in the Bronx. I get my sister and we begin to try to hail a cab to get uptown. All trains and buses have stopped running. The cabs have taken the last rides out the city, not to return. Luckily, we hitch a ride with a couple with a van that has come from Jersey to provide rides for people stranded in the city. He takes us to 125th street, and returns downtown to pick up more people. Now we started the most eery part of the journey, walking to the Bronx. The streets where crowed and traffic was backed up, but you wouldnt know it if your eyes were closed. The sound of nothing but yourself walking is all you could hear. No conversation, no horns, no music from the cars, no babies crying in strolers. The city was silenced. Crossing the Madison street bridge into the Bronx with people covered in sut and debree from the towers was a feeling- a sight one can never forget. The only sound now was a lady who had come out her apt. in the projects by the bridge to set up a microphone and a speaker soulfully singing "Sweet Chariot". The next week was the constant news broadcasts and video footage of the tragedy that I witnessed that tuesday. It's almost going on 6 months and I still have discussions of the shock, fright and sadness- nearly everyday, with friends, family, even strangers. I can never forget that tuesday. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story81.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-02-26 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 152.163.205.76 Annotation Annotations to this item. Personal connection to someone at site Religion Struggle to get home WTC, attack NY:3 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: I was conducting individual English assessments on second grade English Language Learners. I was out in a trailer, when my mom called me on the cell phone and told me. It was still early and what had happened was very unclear. She was in a panic and wanted to rush to my own children's school and bring them home. My collegues and I tried to discreetly catch bits of information from the television when students were out of the classroom and we watched the events unfold before us. As a Muslim-American I can't begin to tell you the grief, shock and sense of utter betrayal that I felt as I began to learn that Muslims were involved in this horrifying attack. It was several weeks before I allowed myself to sob uncontrollably one early morning in my quiet trailer. I went to candlelight vigils and a memorial service for a local 12-year-old passenger who was onboard the plane that crashed into the Pentagon. I tried to make sense of it all, to no avail. There's so much pain and suffering around the world, much of it due to the greediness of powerful countries . . . so I think I understand the frustration and anger felt by so many of the world's oppressed - including those in the Middle East and especially Palestine. But I feel so betrayed by the few so-called Muslims who have hijacked my religion and twisted it in such a way as to be able to carry out this monstruous and barbaric act. I don't understand God's plan here, . Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story1300.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-08-20 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 67.201.214.113 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: I was at work hearing the news and there is no words to explain the feeling of what I felt. It was like "OH MY GOD". All the employees here at the hospital were in shock in just like another world. No one can believe this was happening here in a place of so much freedom. When I left to go home there was such a silence in the streets and for NEwark, NJ to be like this was very strange, there was such a silence that you can hear your own heart beat. It was so overwhelming and I cried as I drove home and just hugged my boys and say thank you god for making them and my family safe. Working in a mental health environment and seeing the high volume of calls that came in from lots of different people that just wanted to know WHY. And to see how our hospital got people together and decided how to help others right away was the most beautiful thing to know that there are people who care, and there are people that have a heart was so heart warming. My prayers go to everyone today. We all have tears and can feel the pain of losing so many lives. I just wish one thing that people would take time and just live today and smile and just turn around and help by holding a door or just volunteering in aftershools programs where there is so many kids that just want a friend, just take time to stop the fighting and remember you have a gift today your LIFE. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story2598.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-11 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 130.219.206.254 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: On September 11,2001 I was at school and I was not aware of what was happening because my teachers did not indicate that anything was wrong.When I got home however my aunt and uncle were looking at the tv and my uncle said "my god thet then knocked down them towers". I asked him what happened and he explained to me that planes had crashed into the World Trade Center and they had killed thousands of people.I asked how did it happen and my uncle told me terroist had taken over a planes and crashed them into the centers.I looked at the tv and footage of the towers going down and people running away from the dust of the towers and some people geeting caught and the dust and others coming out of it.All those people screaming,crying,and standing in shock at what happened. At first I admit I could not believed what happened but slowly as the day of when this happened went on it dawned on me how bad it was.When it was time for me to go to sleep that night I could not because I was scared. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story20589.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2006-09-11 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 68.186.239.238 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: That was one of the most confusing and horrible days of my life. To start, I woke up to a beautiful, sunny day, and I walked my dog just like every other morning. That, however, was the last time I felt normal for quite a while. When I came back in, I saw the initial headline on the washingtonpost.com homepage, and because there was no story attached yet, I turned on my TV and saw the first tower engulfed in flames. I was horrified, but since there was no definite cause identified, I thought it was just an accident. Then as I watched, the second plane hit and another huge burst of flames and smoke exploded from the other tower, and I knew that there was something terribly wrong. My heart was crying as I watched the debris float from the tower, realizing that some of what was falling from the buildings were people. I immediately sent an email to my parents because I knew they'd be checking at their desks at work, but they hadn't heard yet about anything. I continued watching the events unfold on TV, then all of a sudden the reports started coming in about the plane hitting the Pentagon. Of course, since I live in Arlington just a couple miles west of the Pentagon and I use the bus and subway station there when I go into DC, I was immediately worried. My mom, now that I had gotten her watching the news, sent me a frantic email telling me to stay home until we could get a better grasp on what was happening. To be honest, I was very worried, somewhat panicked, and thinking about heading out to a friend's house about an hour and a half outside of DC, so instead of adding to the confusion on the already packed highways, I got away from the terrible images on the TV and walked out to my front yard for some sunlight and fresh air. There was a strange quiet outside. I live on a busy road that leads directly to the Pentagon, but there seemed to be less traffic than usual, and I imagined that everyone was glued to a TV or a radio trying to comprehend what was happening. As I said before, it was such a beautiful day, and I felt the cold irony of that juxtaposed against the terror I had just witnessed on the television. I took a deep breath and walked down to the street and looked east towards the Pentagon and I could just see the smoke over the hills between me and it. I went back to my apartment and continued to watch the latest news, and watched as the towers buckled under the heat and damage to their structures and collapsed. I thought of all of the rescue workers who had just bravely charged into those buildings to save lives and who had given theirs instead. I sent silent, tearful thanks to them, and added my deepest condolences to those of the rest of the nation to the rescue workers' families. I sent off messages to a couple people I know who work in DC to make sure they were safe, and they were, but they soon joined the throng of people who had been sent home early from work. Many of my family and friends sent emails or instant messages or called that day and those that followed to make sure I was okay and to discuss our disbelief and sorrow about what had happened. Even though I didn't know anyone directly who perished in the tragedies in NYC, the Pentagon, or in the countryside of Pennsylvania, I feel the events of that day have been indelibly etched in the way I approach my everyday life. It also has a binding effect on many people that I meet, because almost everyone shares in the pain that still echoes in the phrases "September 11th" and "9/11." Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story204.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-03-09 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 141.156.15.100 Annotation Annotations to this item. Internet Rescue/clean-up workers/volunteers DC:2 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: On this day of September 11 2001, I was outdoors washing my car, and enjoying the blue sky and sunshine and the phone ring , I went indoors to answer it and it was my sister telling me to turn on the tv . As I did just that and to my horror I tuned in just as the second airplane hit the tower ,and to say that I could not belive , my eyes is a understatment. All that I could do was sit on the sofa and cry . I cryed for our country and the people of New York and prayed for God to give this country's leaders the strength to get us thru this disaster. New York, I love you and may God always be with us and watch over our country. Elysia Robertson /// 9-11-202 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story5190.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-11 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 216.76.202.10 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: At the time, I was working overnight shifts, at a group home for handicapped adults. My shift ended at 9 am. The tv was on at work when I left, and everything was fine. I lived in an apartment across the street from the home where I worked. I walked home, and after a few minutes, turned on the tv. There had been some type of explosion, cause unknown, at one of the World Trade Towers. I watched, mostly curious at that point. After a while, they figured out that a plane had hit the tower. That's when I remembered, my father was supposed to be flying from Rochester to Texas that day. I didn't know what plane he was on, what time he was supposed to leave, or where he was. Then another plane hit, and another, and the crash in a field down south. (When you're in Northern/Western NY, everything is south.) We didn't here from my father until late that afternoon. His plane had been diverted to Chicago, but they weren't telling anyone in the airport what was going on, so he didn't know to call us and tell us he was okay. My stepmother and I would up driving to Chicago Wednesday night to pick him up. It was an eerie trip, listening to the news repeat on the radio, with no new news, asking at every rest stop and gas station we stopped at if there was news, and, as we drove through the night, seeing the wide night sky without the lights of airplanes. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story11401.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. anonymously Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2005-05-10 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 128.205.231.53 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: I was at work on the 3rd Floor of the Federal Building on the fateful morning of September 11, 2001. We had just concluded an office meeting around 8:50 when we began receiving phone calls from friends and relatives. They were all saying that a tower of the World Trade Center had been hit by a jet confiscated by terrorists. As the events of the morning unfolded, our entire staff at the U.S. Bankruptcy Court gathered in my office. We listened to live radio reports and attempted to access CNN's website for any information. Everyone who came into our building was terrified to be there, afraid we would be a possible target. After all 4 planes had crashed at 3 different locations and thousands were feared dead, all 13 of us formed a circle and joined hands and immediately began to pray. We were absolutely terrified but we knew no one could handle this situation except God Almighty himself! I clearly remember the hairs on the back of my neck standing straight up. It was unimaginable! We were all sobbing and voicing our concerns about going to war (for there was no question that this meant war)! We all had this overwhelming urge to rush to our children's schools and hold them as tight as we could, to call our husbands and wives to say We Love You! I had no doubt in my mind that our President would make sure that those responsible for this tragedy would eventually be brought to justice. This act did not demoralize our country, take away our freedom or lessen our resolve but it did make us more determined than ever to uphold those principles we hold so dear. Rhonda Gentry Federal Building Rome, GA USA Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story2492.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-09-11 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 207.41.16.3 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource September 11 Digital Archive Stories Description An account of the resource This collection is the bulk of the archive, representing the reactions and experiences of thousands of individuals beginning in 2002. 911DA Story 911DA Story: Story Tell us about what you did, saw, or heard on September 11th. Feel free to write as much or as little as you like. Tell us your story: I was working at my job and thinking about that night when my friendsand I would go out to the bar to celebrate my 31th birthday. As I got back into the truck and started the engine the radio came on. There was a story being told about somone hitting the World Trade Center in New York. The fact that I had the radio on one of these "fun" stations led me to believe that the people were joking about something rather off-color. When I came across some of my friends,I realized that what I had been listening to was NOT a joke but a real story in the making. later that night when my friends asked me where I wanted to go and have a drink I decided that I did not feel like celebrating my personal day. Some could not understand this but I just felt like even though this happened 2000 miles away from my home, these were still my own fellow countrymen,and it was not right to celebrate when so many families had lost loved ones. instead we waited a couple of weeks and then went out for a somber meal at our favorite restauraunt. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource story11596.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. anonymously Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. story Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2005-07-07 IP Address The IP address of the device used to submit the item. 65.120.4.51