A Decade of Hope (48 page)

Just when you feel that you are getting through it, you get another notification. I knew it could be coming for two reasons: One, they continued to advance the technology, so that it was now possible to identify remains that they couldn't identify before, and second, because you had to make a decision when you filled out the paperwork initially, whether you wanted to be notified. And we did want to be notified. Our view was, I think, that we wanted to make Glenn as whole as we could. And when his remains were then found we had another decision to face: What do we do with the pine box with his possessions in his plot? Dig it up, take it away, and put the coffin with his remains in it? Do we put it on top of the first coffin? What would the cemetery allow? Again, this was a highly unusual circumstance, and in the end the cemetery worked it out so that we could open up the gravesite, leave the first box in place, and bury Glenn's remains atop the box. That's the way it stands now.

 

Glenn's colleagues at Holland & Knight later worked very closely with Chief Harry Meyers of the FDNY to sponsor a beautiful bronze memorial wall on Liberty Street. It honors the 343 firefighters who gave their lives on 9/11, and it also honors Glenn. I know that it wasn't an easy process to get things going there back then, just in terms of various city regulations, and particularly in the face of the difficulties across the street at the official memorial at Ground Zero. I went out to the studio in New Jersey where the clay modeling of the memorial was being finished. That's when it became very real for me. To see it up on a wall in this studio in clay, essentially being born, was when it hit me just how significant and magnificent it was going to be.

The most memorable thing to me about the dedication of that memorial wall was some of the family members—mothers, in particular—were coming up to me and our family, thanking us for giving them a place to go. There are one hundred twenty-eight firefighter families with no remains at all, and Ground Zero is their burial place, their cemetery, and just across the street is this beautiful memorial. I don't know that I or our family deserve any thanks for that, but if Glenn served as the inspiration, then that's very gratifying.

That memorial wall is now part of the walking tours given through the Tribute Center on Liberty Street. Together, the Tribute Center, the memorial wall, and Ground Zero itself tell a very important part of the story of what went on that day. Every September 11, which is always a very bittersweet and full day for me, I have various responsibilities, but I always pay my personal respects to Glenn and all the others by attending some of the ceremonies in the morning and getting back there at night, whether it's twelve midnight or two in the morning, to just kind of “degrief.” It's usually a very stunning scene to see late at night, with the wall all lit up with sometimes as many as a hundred people standing there. There's usually a long row of candles on the ground, stretching all fifty-six feet of the memorial, artwork that children have left about 9/11, and firefighters standing at attention—and all kinds of flowers. In some ways it really brings you back very immediately to the events of 9/11.

 

I also wanted official recognition of Glenn by the United States government, which initially was not forthcoming. He went into the World Trade Center as a firefighter. He was part of the rescue operation, and yet the United States of America seemed to have a problem formally designating him as a first responder. I also wanted a lasting recognition of his inspirational act and the actions of so many others, first responders and non–first responders, at the scene—not one that would be sponsored for just a few days but for months after, to help rebuild the city and the country and our national spirit. To me that was the best thing that I could get involved with if I was going to get involved with something to honor my brother, because it directly reflected the way he lived his life—not just as a firefighter, but as an attorney, and as an extraordinarily good Samaritan in his everyday life.

I got a phone call one day a few months after 9/11 from a friend of twenty years who lives in California, David Paine. A lot of native New Yorkers who have moved elsewhere felt a little disconnected: This tragedy happened in their city, even if they were now far away. David wanted to do something, and explained that what had moved him most was how people had responded. He was aware that the New York Mets had donated a day's pay to the New York Police and Fire Widows' and Children's Benefit Fund. David suggested we make 9/11 a day of service. It was a lofty goal, but it seemed right. We were all aware of what was going on around Ground Zero, how everybody was pulling together in a way that had never been seen in our country before, with the possible exception of Pearl Harbor. David had already been doing some work on it, and we put our heads together. Now, a decade later, September 11 is a national day of service in the United States, with millions of people participating. It's one of those really wonderful examples of how a simple idea can turn into a major thing.

The seeds were sown early in 2002, and President Obama signed it into law as part of the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act in April 2009. All throughout that period millions of people had been participating in this grassroots initiative, which just grew and grew and grew every year. The notion is very simple: Mark September 11 to engage in some form of good deed. It could be in an organized way or in some self-directed project. You want to buy groceries for your elderly neighbor—great; it counts. You want to donate blood, or write a big check to a worthy cause, or donate clothes, oror do something that is part of an organized thing, walk for breast cancer, or whatever it might be, or do some volunteer work within your company—that sounds terrific. Whatever it is, get out and do something appropriate and meaningful to mark September 11, to remember those who perished.

And so something good has risen out of the ashes of Ground Zero. The fact that it ultimately became a matter of law is terrific, as it has given an added boost to the initiative. People from all fifty states and from 165 countries participate in one way or another, even if it's just visiting our Web site
MyGoodDeed.org
.

David and I have had much public relations experience, so we know how to get the message out. We have had extraordinary press coverage. There were some PR people on the board who were friends, along with other family members, and we were able to spread the word and build support for it—not only support for it but participation. We had the great help of a lobbyist/attorney in Washington, Fred Dumbo, who worked the halls of Congress and set up meetings for us. There's not much political about this project—it's about as safe a spot as you could find. Just mark that day by doing something good for somebody else.

The first thing we did was to start meeting with the members of the 9/11 organizations, because we felt that if it didn't make sense to the 9/11 community, then it was not going to make sense to anyone else. And we got unanimous approval from all of the few dozen leaders whom we approached. Then Senators Hillary Clinton and Chuck Schumer and Congressmen Peter King and Mike Ferguson endorsed us and helped.

You don't have to be a 9/11 family member to know how 9/11 changed this country—almost completely for the worst, right? Think of the airport security issues, how we deal with other countries now, how you walk into an office building, what your kids have learned about the way of the world. There's very little, unfortunately, that hasn't been touched by 9/11. It's part of the reason that we're involved in two wars, and so the economy of our country is negatively affected. It's pretty much across-the-board negative. And of course it's negative at its core, because nearly three thousand people died. But there have been some good and inspiring responses to 9/11 too. Former New York Giant George Martin, a Super Bowl champion, lost a few neighbors in New Jersey and wanted to do something. When he learned that thousands were now sick, and some [were] dying as a result of their service, and that proper funding wasn't there for them, he wanted to help raise money and awareness, and so [he] walked across the country to raise money. Extraordinary. So 9/11 has become a special call to action for many people who are looking for a way to be generous, community-minded, or simply caring. That's promising, I think.

 

I know that there are some things that are terrible and unfair about all of this—that nineteen guys and whoever was supporting them could have had such a huge negative impact on the world. It's horrific; there's no justification for it, and there's no way to fix it. The part of me that is the sibling of a firefighter, though, knows that Glenn knew that he was taking a risk every time he went on a call, whether for a car fire or a burning building. That's part of what you buy into being a firefighter. While his circumstances were extraordinary in that he was not FDNY and didn't have to run into that building, the fact that he chose to makes him very heroic in my mind. He had the skills, guts, and the wherewithal to go there and to try to help people he didn't know, people who were in danger. It's all the more reason why we have to take care of our firefighters, our police, and anyone who is in the rescue business. The job they choose is to put themselves at risk for others who can't help themselves.

I hate having lost my brother; I hate it every single day. But it would have been more bearable if it wasn't the result of terrorism. This was not an accident, not fate. These were people who went out to kill people. There's no way to get your arms around that, for there's no sense to it at all. While Glenn ran in, there were many in the towers who did not make that choice, who did not know that morning when they went to work that they would be facing life-threatening danger.

During the time when we were battling for federal recognition of Glenn's firefighting line-of-duty status, I met Governor [George] Pataki one morning at Ground Zero. The governor had signed a New York State law that designated Glenn's as a line-of-duty death, and [him] as an active firefighter on the day he died. I thanked him for that law, and he talked to me about how meaningful firefighters were to him, that his dad had been a volunteer firefighter too. Not long ago I met Vice President [Joe] Biden at Ground Zero, and he talked to me about the rescue professionals who showed up at the scene when his family had had a horrific car accident, in which he lost his wife and two of his children. The first thing he said to me was how personally indebted he was to firemen and policemen and those folks for saving the life of one of his children at the crash. I think if there's one good thing that's come out of 9/11, it's a greater national appreciation for firefighters and police. And that's a good thing, because they are really among our greatest heroes.

I think it's amazing what volunteer firefighters do. Of course they don't get paid, so it's very altruistic. I know the training that my two brothers received was extraordinary. In many ways I wonder if the firefighters of Long Island have training that is better than, or matched by, that of any fire department in America. Maybe they don't go to as many fires, and so maybe there's a lot less on-the-job training, so therefore they have to do an extraordinary amount of coursework. All I know is that none of the volunteer firefighters I met through my brothers were slouches in any way. It is like an exclusive club, but so is a big city firehouse. I've really come to see this in the years since 9/11. They have a fraternity that's very aggressive about what they do, men and women. They have to have relationships that make the difficult and the dangerous tolerable. I don't make the distinction between career firefighters and volunteer firefighters, for many of the volunteer firefighters I know are for the most part also career firefighters. All of these men and women are balancing their regular jobs and their families with being firefighters. It is not a job for them, and yet they treat it as if it were. They do it for their communities, and it's hard work, a lot of risk, and time spent away from their families What these volunteer firefighters sacrifice for their communities truly is impressive, and I'm proud that Glenn was a part of that.

Akiko Takahashi lost her father, Keiichiro Takahashi, when the Twin Towers fell. Twenty-four Japanese citizens died that terrible day, and Keiichiro, a Long Island resident and New York banker, was one of them. By 9/11 he had advanced in his profession to become the senior vice president of Euro Brokers, which had offices high up in the South Tower. Keiichiro's greatest love was spending time with his wife, Harumi, and their children: his son, Hiroyuki, who was living and working in Japan, and his daughter, Akiko, who was at Tufts University on 9/11. He was very excited about his plans to retire from business when Akiko graduated from college. Now, in honor of her father, Akiko volunteers, giving tours and sharing her story with others, at the Tribute WTC Visitor Center.

 

 

 

M
y parents had just moved from London to Los Angeles when I was born. I've never lived in Japan, and we moved to New York when I was two. We have been serious about preserving Japanese culture within our family, and so my parents sent me to Japanese school on the weekends all through grammar school. I learned to read and write there, and I don't have any trouble getting by when I travel to Japan.

We actually spoke Japanese in the house all the time. I was not allowed to talk in English, and even when I spoke to my brother in English, my mother would tell us to stop. We used to always watch Japanese TV, Japanese news in the morning, and then the movies. My friends were always surprised that I hadn't seen some of the classic [American] eighties films. We were very sheltered, culturally sheltered.

I went to a public high school, East Schreiber High, in Port Washington. It's not that big—a little under three hundred kids in my graduating class. Port Washington is on the water, and is a very pretty town. I think that's probably what drew my dad to the town. There's a dock you can walk along. It's nice.