The scope of what happened ten years ago is quite garganutuan in nature, and there is no conceivable way to cover all the victims of Sept. 11th, not in "The New York Times," not in "The Washington Post," and certainly not on this blog.
One story I wanted to cover was one of the El Salvadoran immigrants who were working at The Window of the Worlds Cafe in the North Tower. By percentage of its population, El Salvador had the highest casualty rate from the September 11th attacks.
At the time, I also read a moving story about a Pakistani immigrant firefigther who was working for the FCDY, who went into the remnants of the Twin Towers to help save lives. He talked about how he was so unsettled at the thought a member of his Muslim faith had performed this heinous action as an act of faith that he was almost unable to concentrate effectively and do his job. In total, 343 firefighters died on Sept. 11th, and many more died from lung disease in the ensuing years due to the smoke inhalation at Ground Zero.
But, in addition to the story of Mari-Rae Soppard, who was going to be the women's gymnastics coach at UC-Santa Barbara which we covered on Friday on our other blog (www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com), we are going to discuss three of the victims of 9-11 here.
Donald Greene was 52 when he died on September 11th. He was traveling on Flight 97 which crashed in Shanksille, Pa., and later became the basis for a critically-accalimed film "Uinted 97." Greene was a resident of Grenwich, Conn., and he left behind a wife and two children.
According to one memorial site, Greene emphaisized eating together as a family every night, and he coached children's soccer in his spare time.
His sister Terry Anne Greene of Massachussetts is an active member of the group September 11th Families for a Peaceful Tomorrow, and he spoke against a state bill in 2007 that would have reinstated the death penalty in Massachussetts.
Zuhtu Ibis, of Clifton, NJ, was 25 when he died as a result of the attacks on the Twin Towers. Ibis, an immigrant from the Turkish village of Sari Yaprak (which means yellow leaf) near the central Anatolian city of Yozgat, was working on the 103rd floor that day. His death was widely covered in the Turkish media.
His brother Mehmet Ibis was also a New Jersey resident and he tried desperately to find his brother. As a result of feeling overwhelmed from the day's events, Mehmet parked his car outside the Hoboken train station which stood in clear view of Ground Zero. In the process, Mehmet fell asleep. Some police officers knocked on his window as they questioned what he was doing. When it was realized that he was a Turkish person, the FBI and search dogs came in, and Mehmet was even arrested. The police officers, to their credit, apologized for the incident, but in a 2006 interview Mehmet Ibis said he was still angry about the way he had been treated.
Stephen Mulderry, 33, an equity trader, worked 14 floors beneath Zuhtu Ibis on the
89th floor of the World Trade Center. He would say goodbye to his family along with 30 co-workers in a conference call. One friend left the following message regarding Mulderry on a victims memorial page: "Will be thinking about you on Sunday. The world misses your smile."
Anne Mulderry told the public program "Interfaith Voices" that her Catholic faith has help guide her through the loss of her son. His mother also told his hometown newspaper "The Times-Union" in Albany, NY, that Stephen had just completed a deck over Labor Day where the whole family had gathered to spend the holiday weekend together.
Mulderry, who had since become a resident of New York City, was also the co-captain of his college basketball team at The University of Albany.
PERSONAL NOTE: Both part of this series and the conclusion of my two-part series on Amanda Rigg, a 22-year-old Australian tourist, who was killed during the Sept. 10, 2001, bombing in Istanbul, Tukey, by far-left militants that killed three people, are on my sister blog "Politics, Culture and Other Wastes of Time" (www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com).
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