The most asked question this weekend will be “where were you?” I was living in Massachusetts and on my way to the doctor. The news on the radio said that something, probably a small plane, had hit the World Trade Center. By the time my appointment was over all hell had broken loose. The odd part is that I had just been in New York the day and weekend before. I had stood atop the stadium in Flushing Meadows looking over at Manhattan, at the Towers, thinking I should go up again one day. When I arrived home there were panicked calls on my voice mail because my friends and family had known I was in New York and weren’t sure I’d returned. I assured everyone I was safe then sat stunned, watching the events unfold.
The editors of the Text Message want to commemorate that day and encourage our readers to tell us where they were. Next week we will run a daily series of posts by one of our colleagues, Onaona Guay, who is processing series of records (and artifacts) from the Records of the American National Red Cross (NAID 783), September 11 Recovery Program. These records are some of the very few our unit possess relating to September 11th. Of course, researchers interested in what all of NARA has should use our Online Public Access (OPA) system to find what else exists in our holdings. We also encourage you to read posts by other NARA staff from around the agency. Both Narations and Prologue: Pieces of History have posts dedicated to the anniversary of 9/11.
While these records are not yet available to the public, most will be soon (many in the form of online digital images), and we wanted to share some of the poignancy of what’s being discovered as they are processed.
Image courtesy of the George W. Bush Library flickr page.