Twenty-Five Years On…
Today is the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attack on America – the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, as well as one hijacked plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. A devastating event that we reflect on as a nation today…
I was in New York on September 11, 2001 – until the 20 year anniversary, I never posted about that day…but, on the 25th remembrance today, here is what I experienced that week, giving credit to some of the people who were there with me.
I was Senior Vice President of Programming for E! Entertainment Television, as well as the Executive Producer of Howard Stern’s E! TV show.
Howard was a consummate professional to work with, as was his Producer Gary Dell-Abate, co-host Robin Quivers and Producer Fred Norris as well.
On the morning of September 11 2001, Howard brought me into the studio at around 8:15a ET – he gave me a chance to promote my wife’s new syndicated dating show, “elimiDATE.”
Moments later, Scott The Engineer came into our control room on the way to Howard’s studio with this comment:
“A small plane hit the World Trade Center.”
Moments later Howard interrupted his show to report the same thing on the air – and for the next 6+ hours, Howard stayed on the radio live as the horrific events of that day unfolded.
Since Manhattan was locked down, for the rest of that week, the E! team worked with Gary and his available team to put Howard’s radio show on the air every day. Bravo to Gary for showing his true leadership skills in handling such a difficult time.
After Howard’s radio show ended that Friday, I took a walk toward the World Trade Center site.
These Are My Photos From That Day…
I left the studio in mid-town and began walking south, a brown haze still in the air. Suddenly a mass of people were running toward me, and one person shouted: “There’s a bomb!” as he raced by.
It wasn’t true, but that was the level of anxiety and confusion that was still pervasive in the city.
I kept walking south, ultimately down to Union Square on E. 14th street. These are my photos from that day, which I had never shared before. This is what I experienced in the next hour:
Butcher block paper was laid out everywhere on the ground, being signed by countless people, messages paying homage to those who lost their lives, and mourning those still missing…
It was there the police had blocked off streets south toward the site of the attack. I walked along 14th, going west when I saw one street open.
A mass of people were slowly moving through the street, clearly following a single person in the middle of the crowd.
Cheers were coming from the crowd, as well as people looking down from the many apartment buildings that lined the narrow street.
I couldn’t tell who it was at first, but the ongoing cheers around a single figure was mesmerizing. I called my wife, now back in Los Angeles after her own harrowing post-9/11 staff bus trip from Seattle, and held the phone up so she could hear the crowd.
As they cheered again, I looked to my left, and standing just a few feet away from was Chelsea Clinton.
She was watching her father, the former President of the United States, walking with the crowd…he was there to offer solace.
I watched for several minutes as we slowly moved south along this street, which had been blocked off to all traffic. Suddenly I heard a police siren blare loudly.
A screaming police car sped toward us on the street, and everyone quickly backed up to clear the street. I found myself pressed against a parked car, tightly wedged in among the crowd.
Suddenly, pressed up against me, surrounded by two Secret Service agents, was Bill Clinton.
After the car passed, he stepped back, shook my hand, said a few words and moved on to others in the crowd.
I kept watching as he spoke to hundreds of people, offering solace…I will never forget that moment, and how healing his appearance had been.
As I said, until the 20th anniversary I had never shared these photos…today, the One World Freedom Tower rises over that area:
The memorial there is sobering, and once again it is time to reflect on what we all lost that day, and how we had to rise up again as a nation…
The following year, Bruce Springsteen released his brilliant album called “The Rising”, which looked at 9/11 and the impact it had on our country and the world – and changed us forever.
If you haven’t heard it, it’s powerful, difficult at times, and also inspiring in a healing way.
You can hear the title track and more about the album here:
I know that many experienced this tragedy up close, and many lost loved ones as well. It changed the course of our country’s history forever…today is a day to remember them all…
Categories: Memoirs, New York, Travel, Travel Adventures, Travel Memoir
johnrieber 
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