September 17, 2014
Est. 1948
Volume 67 | Issue 1
the pace press pacepress.org
9/11 Honoring the memory of
DR. BILL OFFUTT Professor of History & Faculty Advisor of the Pforzheimer Honors College
At the request of The Pace Press, Dr. Bill Offutt provided written recollections of his experience on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. While the integrity of the document remains, some parts have been condensed. We thank Prof. Offutt for this valuable record. It started for me on the bus to NYC, which I caught about 8:35am. Along Route 3 there are places with a good view of the World Trade Center and the guy sitting next to me said, “The World Trade Center is on fire.” I looked up and saw the first one burning out the side with a lot more smoke coming out of the top. I said something like ‘that looks bad, look at the top, it’s all venting out of that like a chimney.’ We continued to move toward the Lincoln Tunnel, and people were flipping on their Walkman radios to get info— one guy said a plane hit the building. I remember thinking, ‘ok the Empire State Building got hit by a bomber [airplane] and survived,’ and no one on the bus knew what sort of plane [was involved in this crash] anyway. Traffic slowed, we dropped out of sight for a while, and then it became clear that the 2nd tower was on fire too. At this point, the guy with the radio said another plane had hit it, and the guy next to me said “yea I saw it go in.” We deduced then that it had to be terrorists, especially when the reports started coming out that it was a twin-engine jet that slammed in (wasn’t clear to us that it was a passenger plane, just that it was intentional). Still I never thought the buildings would come down—they’d survived the ’93 bombing. I got into the Port Authority Bus Terminal at about 9:20-25, and there was a huge crowd around one of the TV screens. I didn’t stop, but continued to the subway to go to work. I took the 7 train across town, sitting next to a couple of people talking about it, and I joined in—everyone was trying to figure out what was going on, there were no strangers. At Grand Central, I transferred to the downtown 4/5 lines, which are expresses—you get to Pace at the Brooklyn Bridge station in just 2 stops. The train was very quiet, and slow—congestion due to trains being rerouted. But that was expected too, again from the ’93 experience, when service is disrupted the whole system starts
Photo by Miguel Morales, The Pace Press ‘01-’02 Photo Editor
REMEMBERING 9/11 continued on PAGE 7
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