I wonder
if those who recalled Lincoln’s assassination remembered exactly where they
were when they heard about it? Or what
about the surrender of the Alamo to Santa Anna?
I would wager they did recall. “Remember
the Alamo.” That battle call still
exists. Those world-shattering events seem to burn their memories into our
brains and into posterity, don’t they?
Where
were you when Kennedy’s assassination happened in Dallas? I remember precisely. I was shopping in a super market in
Bloomington, Indiana. I was a post grad
student at IU and had a family to feed, so I was shopping for some
groceries. The PA system was playing
music from an FM radio station for some background music. The announcer broke into the music and said,
“here is a bulletin. President Kennedy
has been shot in Dallas. More details as
we get them.” I ran home as quickly as I could, turned on the TV and watched it
for two days non-stop. The University
was closed and I and the rest of the world watched in disbelief. I will never forget.
Now the
obvious question – where were you and what were you doing on September 11, 2001
at about 9 AM? I was living in West Palm
Beach with Jeri at her town house. I
typically watched the business news on CNBC
-- which was before Fox Business Channel came into being. I was standing in the bedroom, having just
returned from walking Jeri to her job a short distance away and doing my
morning jog as I came back home. The
reporter was relating the latest financial news when his attention was diverted
by a colleague. He was momentarily
frustrated by the diversion, but quickly got his news face back on and told his
audience, “A small airplane has apparently hit the twin towers here in lower
Manhattan. We will have more details
shortly.” Then within a very few
seconds, he returned to the air and corrected himself – telling me and his vast
audience that it was not a small plane but an airliner. I knew this was really important, so I immediately called the doctor’s office where
Jeri worked and where the break-room had a small TV. I gave her the quick version of the story and
told her to turn on the TV. That was the beginning of hours of coverage that we
all watched non-stop. The second air
liner into the towers – then a third at the Pentagon and forth headed to the
White House but heroically diverted and taken over and brought down by its
passengers in open country in PA. That was a frightening time, embedded into our
memories forever. And today is the
anniversary of that terrible day in our history.
I wonder
if those back in Lincoln’s day mocked and tried to under play the seriousness
of his death? Probably. That was nearly 150 years ago. Maybe enough time has passed that we can joke
about weather Mrs. Lincoln enjoyed the play.
But our tragedy, the death of the twin towers by Muslim extremists, is
only 18 years old. There is no
justification for minimizing its importance and seriousness. Those who would fluff it away are either totally
misinformed or some sort of young radical bigot with an agenda, who has no business living in this country and
enjoying its fruits and great opportunities.
That terrible morning in 2001, 18 years ago will never leave my
memory. And its cowardly perpetrators
will go down as the worst mankind has to offer.
To forget is to drop our defense.
To forget is to stop thinking about all the hundreds of innocent folks
who burned like a roasted chicken left on the grill too long – and all the
firefighters and cops and citizens who gave their lives trying to rescue
people.
I am not
a flag waver. Although I am very
patriotic, I do not normally write about such stuff. But – like General Eisenhower commanded after
rescuing the Jews and others from the concentration camps after WW II – He told
the world that he ordered pictures and films made for posterity so this would
never happen again and no one would ever forget and say it didn’t happen. I would say the same about 9/11. It did happen and it was awful. Let us never forget.
From the
heart of Olaf Hart………
