Monday, September 11, 2023

One Man's Story 9/11

There are things that tie this nation together, Pearl Harbor, Challenger, and 9/11 as it has come to be known. But now 22 years on, many people not directly affected by the great loss of life or living in New York at the time may have forgotten the hours immediately after the first plane roared into the North Tower of the World Trade Center.

The current president Joe Biden will skip today's ceremonies in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. It is his belief that it is time for our Nation to move on. He has said the same about Pearl Harbor in the past.

Certainly anyone over the age of 30 understands what happened that day, but still only a small number of Americans know what New York was like during the attack and in the first hours after.

CP was thankfully not in New York on September 11th having left the city two days prior. I watched the second plane impact the South Tower live on television. The rest of the day is a distant memory, except for the silence in the air that afternoon. Unknown to me one of my colleagues a fellow investment professional was at ground zero.

His story arrived 2 days later via fax at my office. The following images are of that fax that I've kept in my top desk drawer for the last 22 years. Today I'm sharing one man's story unedited (note you will have to click on each image to enlarge) someday maybe today I'll transcribe the letter, an effort I have once before attempted but found it to difficult to type the words:










Cedar's Take: I'm still stunned at what happened that crystal clear Carolina morning in September and while I lost no friends or family in the attack the pain is just as if I had. 

My grandfather a Navy vet never hated the Germans but he despised the "Japs". I never understood why until 9/11. It takes a pretty horrific event to make an entire group of people the most hated and despised of the world's population. Muslims have unfortunately accomplished just that. 

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