Paying the Price of Freedom

Police Officer David P. LeMagne of the Port Authority of New York/New Jersey Police Department was just twenty-seven years old when he died in the line of duty at the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan on September 11, 2001.  He had been a member of the Port Authority PD for less than one year when he responded with the Port Authority PD's Special Ops Unit to the World Trade Center.  

He was not part of the Special Ops Unit.  He was assigned to Journal Square in Jersey City.  Yet, after the North Tower was struck, he implored - in fact practically begged his Lieutenant - to permit him to head across the Hudson River to Lower Manhattan.  Prior to joining the Port Authority PD in 2000, Officer LeMagne had spent several years working as a paramedic at Jersey City Medical Center and University Hospital in Newark as an EMT.  On what tragically proved to be the final morning of his life, Officer LeMagne insisted on being where his skills would best be put to use helping the thousands of people at work in the World Trade Center.  By being where he needed to be - and not where he was assigned to be - Officer LeMagne effectively traded his life for that of countless others.  Others who he did not know and who did not know him. 

Police Officer David Prudencio LeMagne's body was recovered from Ground Zero in January 2002, approximately one year after he had first joined the Department.  The last known photograph of him?  Helping carry an injured woman out of danger - using a door as a gurney - which door he then set down before he ran back into the building to help others still inside. 

Police Officer David P. LeMagne - September 11, 2001

Photo Credit:  Dominick DePinto

Saturday morning, following the Fallen Heroes 5K, Margaret and I were at Bar A with Gidg, Lynne, Raj, and Bindi when we struck up a conversation with several members of the Fourth Watch Motorycyle Club, a great group of guys who make it their mission to not only honor Officer LeMagne's memory but to keep it - and him - alive.  

This Saturday, when Margaret and I place our flags at the September 11 Memorial in lower Manhattan, we shall place one for Police Officer LeMagne.  We shall do so not simply this year but every year thereafter when we are in Manhattan for the Tunnel to Towers Run.  "Never Forget" is not a catchphrase.  It is a commitment. 

Spring Lake September 11 Memorial 

It is a commitment that is renewed every day.  Every day.

-AK 

 

A Journey to the Final Frontier

On Saturday afternoon, the Missus and I shall make our annual (last year notwithstanding) pilgrimage to the National September 11 Memorial in lower Manhattan and we shall do what we have done since the Memorial opened, which is place flags at about a dozen and one-half names.   Included among the names are the ten University of Colorado Buffaloes who were murdered that day. 

Chad Keller (AeroEngr '93) is one of the ten Buffs whose memory we honor.  

Chandler Raymond Keller (AeroEngr '93)

Photo Credit:  Adam Kenny 

I did not know Chad Keller.  Given that I graduated from CU in 1989 and he did likewise in 1993, I suspect that I graduated from CU three or four mto onths before he arrived on campus as a freshman.  By all accounts, he was an extraordinary man, loved with equal aplomb by his parents, his wife Lisa who was widowed far too young, and his friends. His dream from the time he was a little boy was to become an astronaut but, as his dad Dick tells it, "his eyes were kind of bad".  

Upon graduating from CU, Chad Keller began a career at Boeing.  He worked as a propulsion specialist for the United States Department of Defense and National Reconnaissance Office launching communication satellites.  In early September 2001 he had flown from California, where he lived, to Washington, D.C. to give a series of briefings at the Pentagon.  Having wrapped up the business that had brought him cross-country, on Tuesday, September 11, he boarded a flight bound for California and home.  Tragically, the flight he boarded was American Airlines Flight 77, which was hijacked and then flowing into the Pentagon as a weapon, killing all the innocents aboard - including Chad Keller.  He was just twenty-nine years old. 

Nineteen years after his death, Chad Keller's lifelong dream of going into space came true.  Astronaut Chris Cassidy, a former Navy Seal who became a NASA astronaut in 2004 and who had never met Chad Keller, made his final journey into space in 2020.  Before he went up, he reached out to Chad Keller's parents and asked if he could "take Chad into space" with him.  He took several mementos up with him - and he also took some of Chad Keller's ashes.  

Chandler R. "Chad" Keller 

A remarkable gesture.  An extraordinary story. 

-AK 

A Participant in the Theft of Time

 Though nothing will keep us together

We could steal time just for one day

We can be heroes for ever and ever

What d'you say?

-"Heroes"

David Bowie

This morning at 9 am, my running companera Gidg, my fleet-footed friend Jerry, and I shall join a field of several hundred runners in the 19th Annual Fallen Heroes 5K, which begins and ends at Bar A on 16th Avenue in Lake Como.  Its purpose?  As stated succinctly on its website, "We will memorialize the ultimate sacrifice of our brothers and sisters and all the lives lost on that day and celebrate their memories!"

Hell of a good way to spend thirty minutes or so on a Saturday morning in September.  It is a race in which fire departments from across New Jersey participate - some in large numbers - including firefighters who are so young that they could not have been more than a few years old, if that, on September 11, 2001.  

For a run-of-the-mill civilian (and fair-to-middling human being) like Yours truly, spending the time in the company of heroes, honoring the memory of heroes, comes damn close to feeling as if I have cheated my way into a gathering I am otherwise unworthy to attend.  Theirs is tremendous company to keep. 

Even if it is just for one day.

-AK 

The Imprint of Love

I have not watched an episode of Saturday Night Live in its entirety in more than thirty years.  Fear not, this is not an old guy rant.  It is an acknowledgment of the effect long work hours and ever-advancing age have had on my ability to stay up late.  Once upon a lifetime ago, SNL was something I watched before my college pals and I headed out to the bars.  Now?  It airs long after I have gone to bed.  

My point is merely this:  I became aware of Pete Davidson well before I ever saw even a clip of him performing on SNL.  Truth be told, I have only seen a handful of clips of him.  By all accounts, he is a funny young fellow.  He certainly seems to be successful.  Even better, he now seems to have a better grasp on the demons and vices with which he has had some rather public struggles.  And for that, I applaud him.  

In addition to being a stand-up comic, television star, and movie actor, Pete Davidson is the son of Scott Davidson of the FDNY.  FF Scott Davidson was one of the six members of Ladder 118 from Brooklyn Heights immortalized in this photograph.

New York Daily News - October 5, 2001

Photo Credit:  New York Daily News

Pete Davidson was a little boy when his dad was killed at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, saving the lives of people he did not know.  He and his little sister, Casey, were robbed of their father before Pete was even ten years old.  A world full of strangers gained a hero.  Pete Davidson and Casey Davidson lost their dad.  

Not a fair trade.  Not even close.  

In 2020, Pete Davidson starred in the film The King of Staten Island, which he described as "semi-autobiographical" and a vehicle for helping him process and deal with his father's loss.   As anyone who has lost a loved one knows, the wound left by loss never heals entirely.  

Wounds may never heal but love never dies.  It remains imprinted on our heart and our soul forever...

...just like a tattoo.  

-AK 

In Service of the Necessity of Loving

There may be no greater disturbance to the Universe's natural order than a parent's burial of a child.  We are not supposed to outlive our kids.  We bring them into this world, for among other reasons, to fill our space when our time here is through.  It is their job to keep us alive after we have passed by sharing stories about us to the children and, hopefully, the grandchildren who follow them.  It is not supposed to be our job to keep alive their memory after they have died by sharing stories of them.  Our movie is supposed to end before their movie does.  A child should outlive his or her parents.  It is only fair.

Among the many things that September 11, 2001 did was disabuse anyone who had not yet received the memo of the notion that Life is fair or even pretends to be.  That day, and every day that has followed behind it, has reinforced the principle of Life's inherent inequity to every family directly affected by its events.  Included among that number, of course, are those families for whom their murdered loved one has not been identified or recovered and who went forward with the necessary memorial service or funeral without a body.  

Consider for a moment that in the dark, desperate days following September 11, 2001, miracles were few and far between.  Among the 343 members of the FDNY killed that morning at the World Trade Center was Firefighter Michael Roberts of Engine 214 in Brooklyn.  At age 31, he had only been on the job for approximately three-and-one-half years when he and his brothers from what is affectionately known as "The Nut House", which is the home of Engine 214 and Ladder 111.  He had only been at Engine 214 for approximately six months, being proud to have been assigned there after he completed his three year rotation period in other firehouses. 

FF Roberts was born into a family of public service.  His uncle, Bob Roberts, and his father, John Roberts, had both been on the job with the FDNY.  When Bob left the FDNY, he passed his badge, #6611, to his brother, John.  John, thereafter, passed it on to his son, Michael, when Michael joined the FDNY.  His family described FF Michael Roberts as a pivotal person in his family and a source of great joy in their lives.  

FF Roberts' mom, Veronica, is the sister of Joseph Fox.  At the time of the September 11 attacks, her brother Joe was also known by his official title, which was NYPD Transit Chief Joseph Fox.  Six weeks or so after the attacks, Michael's body had not been recovered from what was now known as Ground Zero.  His parents opted to do what so many families did - and had to do - which was have a funeral for Michael without a body.  

FF Roberts' funeral was scheduled for Saturday, October 27, 2001.  Approximately twelve hours before his loved ones were to gather to bid him farewell and lower a coffin not containing his body into the earth, fate intervened.  Chief Fox received a phone call from a colleague and long-time friend, the purpose of which was to relay a message to Chief Fox from another colleague and long-time friend, NYPD Chief of Department Joe Esposito.   The message?  On Friday night, the 26th of October, 2001, the body of FF Michael Roberts was found on the pile at Ground Zero.  

As remarkable as it is that his body was found less than twelve hours before his funeral, the truly remarkable piece of the story is that Chief Esposito spearheaded an operation that made sure that FF Roberts made it home in time for his own funeral and his parents, although forced to do something that no parent ever wants to do, were able to see him and say goodbye to him before they had to bury him.  

It is a story that - and I say this with not even a hint of regret or embarrassment - Chief Fox tells significantly better than I ever could.  He shared it in the New York Daily News on Sunday and I cannot recommend it to you enough.  

-AK 

 

The Story A Picture Tells

September 11, 2001 is a day full of vivid, iconic, and heartbreaking images.  One of the most iconic was captured by an amateur photographer.  

Aaron McLamb was a native North Carolinian.  He had grown up wanting to be a fireman.  In the fall of 2001, at age twenty, he lived not too far from the firehouse on Middagh Avenue in Brooklyn Heights that was home to Engine 205 and Ladder 118.  On the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001, Aaron McLamb was doing volunteer work, printing Bibles at a Jehovah's Witness facility in Brooklyn.  Shortly after the North Tower was struck at 8:46 am, he looked out a window and saw flames shooting out of the building.  An amateur photographer, he grabbed his gear and took up a position outside a bay window on his building's tenth floor, a vantage point that allowed him to see the Brooklyn Bridge and the World Trade Center.

From where he sat, he saw the men who were among his heroes, the men of Ladder 118, charging across the Brooklyn Bridge in order to join the battle.  It is a breathtaking photograph.

Ladder 118 crossing the Brooklyn Bridge on September 11, 2001

Photo Credit:  Aaron McLamb/New York Daily News

It is also a heartbreaking photograph. 

All six members of Ladder 118 who raced to the World Trade Center that morning joined the battle with aplomb upon their arrival.  They went to work at the Marriott World Trade Center Hotel, rescuing countless guests, and were last seen heading up into the hotel to save more lives when the Hotel was obliterated first by the collapse of the South Tower, which split the building in half, and thereafter the collapse of the North Tower, which effectively destroyed what was then left of the Hotel.  The FDNY, including the six brave men of Ladder 118, rescued hundreds of the Hotel's guests but paid a terrible price.  

All six members of Ladder 118 who rode through the Gates of Hell that morning were killed.  They were  Lieutenant Robert Egan, Firefighter Joseph Agnello, Firefighter Vernon Cherry, Firefighter Scott Davidson, Firefighter Leon Smith, and Firefighter Peter Vega.  

Board at Ladder 118 - September 11, 2001

Photo Credit:  New York Daily News

Every picture does indeed tell a story.  Learn it.  Commit it to memory.  Never forget it. 

Engine 205 Ladder 118 Brooklyn Heights 

Photo Credit:  Brooklyn Eagle

-AK 

   

One Day Closer To The Shore

I came across this on-line yesterday and found myself nodding in agreement as I read it...

I spent a portion of the morning on Sunday, September 12, 2021 on my weekly "long run" for this year's New York City Marathon.  I ran the outward leg of my run on the roads but, because the morning was so beautiful and it was low tide, I ran the inward leg of my run, barefoot, down at the waterline.  

As I made my way north through Spring Lake, I deviated from my course to take another look at the Memorial that had been erected in the sand as part of the 9/11 Memorial Run just twelve hours earlier. 

And there, there it was, right where it had been placed the previous evening...

...was the flower that Margaret and I had watched that precious little moppet place during the ceremony just twelve hours earlier.  The most extraordinary thing about what she had done was not simply the placement of the flower.  It was the fact that when she first placed it, it fell down.  She had walked over to where her mom stood waiting for her and when she turned back towards the memorial, she saw that it had fallen.  Instead of simply leaving it there, she walked back over to the memorial, and with patience and a purpose that revealed the old soul beneath her baby face, she carefully placed it upright in the sand.  

And the morning after, there it was.    

-AK