The symbolic ringing of a La Pine fire station bell. A prayerful gathering at a Bend hospital. A Redmond police lieutenant, in Scottish regalia, playing a mournful “Amazing Grace.” A hushed Sisters High School crowd, as Sinatra’s signature song, “New York, New York,” cuts off – and the video image changes from the bright lights of Broadway to the horrific scenes we’ve witnessed far too often this day, week and year.

Sure, you could see the emotion-wringing elements of the 9/11 anniversary coming … well, from the new “day of infamy” itself, not all that long ago. But whether you called it “Patriot Day” or 9/11 or the media-hyped “day everything changed,” Wednesday brought echoes of the sights, sounds and swirling emotions that marked a similarly warm, bright day – both in New York and in Bend – a year earlier.

La Pine: The sound of a bell, and fire trucks roll silently at sunrise

On this Sept. 11, a day of heightened national security, local officials and almost 100 community members gathered early Wednesday on the front lawn of the La Pine Fire District’s main station on Huntington Road, to remember the many victims, and many heroes.

Chaplain Ted Gibson led the crowd in prayer: “Help us to remember, and to never forget,” he said, as he asked for peace, protection, and guidance.

The somber crowd watched in the chilly morning air as emergency apparatus rolled out of the station bay – lights flashing, sirens silent – to signify the first response of New York firefighters after the first hijacked plane, carrying 92 people, slammed into the north tower of the World Trade Center at 8:46am (5:46 PDT). Seventeen minutes later, a second plane with 65 people aboard, hit the south tower.

After a long moment of silence, La Pine Fire/Medic Chris Jones rang the station bell in the traditional 5-5-5 code (three sets of five chimes each) while the La Pine High School JROTC lowered the flag to half staff, to commemorate the moment at which the south tower collapsed in a plume of ash and debris – at 9:59am (6:59 PDT).

“Firefighting is a brotherhood,” said an emotional Randy Gordon, the fire district’s board president. After taking a moment to regain his composure, he added, “The common thread that runs through that brotherhood is duty, honor, courage and heroism. … It’s not an accident that these people are called heroes.”

“But there were many, many heroes,” said Deschutes County Sheriff Les Stiles. “There was a group of people in a plane over Pennsylvania that took some extraordinary actions. It’s not clear where exactly that plane was headed, but it was very clear what was intended, and there’s no question that they saved lives.”

Before the ceremony ended, county Commissioner Mike Daly asked everyone to remember those who sacrificed their lives for the sake of others.

“Let’s remember the firefighters and police officers who didn’t hesitate to save someone’s son, wife, husband, father or mother, when they lost their own lives,” Daly said.

Gordon urged everyone to seek out their own personal heroes on this day and to “tell them before it’s their day of remembrance.”

Fire Chief Jim Court couldn’t attend the ceremony because he, fire board vice-president Stu Martinez, firefighter/paramedics Jarrett Fournier, Mark Pautz, Don Taggert and volunteer Kyle Wagner joined hundreds of Northwest firefighters in New York City for the Ground Zero memorial ceremonies.

The group is paying for the trip themselves and using vacation time, according to Gordon. And while they went to a Yankees game, they will be focusing on fire-related activities, such as ride-alongs, and paying their respect to the NYFD.

Court and the others were supposed to join other firefighters from around the nation in a procession from Manhattan to Ground Zero. However, Court called in Wednesday, just as the La Pine ceremony ended, and said it didn’t happen.

“They said there were literally thousands upon thousands of firefighters from around the world,” Gordon said. “So they didn’t have the procession, but just got `em in there. They said it was just an overwhelming experience.”

Bend: Moments of peaceful reflection

Quietness, reflection and a spirit of worship infused “Together as One,” a midday gathering at the Center for Healing and Learning at St. Charles Medical Center, one of several events focusing on the spiritual side of the anniversary.

Sponsored by Interfaith Ministries of Central Oregon, the service was subtitled “A Service of Remembrance and Hope.” It included readings from more than a half-dozen faith traditions, the lighting of candles, prayer and “sharing of peace” among the attendees. Readings, reflections and prayers shared by local clergy and the congregation were interspersed with singing.

The litany of remembrance, repentance and healing included a prayer read in unison by the couple hundred in attendance, including these words:
“Be near us in the struggle and in these moments of remembrance, repentance and hope. Uphold those who work and watch and wait and weep and love. Strengthen us to comfort those who mourn and work in large ways and small for those things that make for peace. Bless the leaders of this nation and all peoples of the earth so that warfare, like slavery before it, may become only an historic memory.”

The service closed with the singing of “World Peace Prayer,” “America the Beautiful” and “A Song of Peace.”

Sisters: Teens’ powerful video, powerful words

More than 500 people filled the Sisters High School auditorium for a different sort of assembly, joined by Deschutes County commissioners and officials. Principal Boyd Keyser urged that everyone not only pay tribute to those lost on 9/11, but “celebrate the greatest nation our world has ever known.”

The Sisters High Band, led by Jody Henderson, then played a gently stylized “Star-Spangled Banner,” which Keyser said sounded pretty good, since the students had been “back all of two days” to practice.

Sally Taylor-Pillar, a teacher at Bend’s year-old Summit High School, then introduced seniors Tiffani Young and Jennifer Northup, who joined two counterparts from Bend and Mountain View highs last spring on a visit to New York, six months after the terrorist attacks. They created a video as part of what became known as “Project Never Forget.”

“Our youth were deeply … changed by the events of the past year,” Taylor-Pillar said. “Youth `get it.’”

When the Sinatra tune gave way to that unforgettable image of the first plane hitting the first tower, a spoken expletive on the tape brought a laugh from students that broke through the silence, but did little to take away from the power of what they were seeing.

“There are no words…” a news announcer on that fateful morning was heard saying.

“The impact New York made on me is so little, compared to the presentation we put together later, which is a surprise,” Young said. “Even going down to Ground Zero, I could believe it, that there had been these huge buildings there and they were gone.”

The video, accompanied by music ranging from Simon and Garfunkel’s “America” to Sarah McLachlan’s “In the Arms of An Angel,” and from John Lennon’s “Imagine” to a student band’s variation of “God Bless America.”

The sights ranged from the typical shots of friends cavorting or just scanning the New York landmarks to interviews of firefighters and police officers and comments by the students about the wall of missing posters – folks all gone, alas – with `so many things left undone in their lives.”

Jane Williamson, an actress and former Bend resident, went to Giants Stadium that day, to film a Wendy’s commercial, but that, like so many things, were interrupted by what happened.

The students’ visit ranged from the fire halls of New York to a chance to meet with high school students in suburban Scarsdale, N.Y., where the principal turned off the TV that day so no one would learn of a parent’s or friend’s fate in the worst of fashions.

Nick Saraceno, a Mountain View High grad now attending New York University, told of watching what happened, seeing the second plane hit, then the first collapse: “It was one of the most awesome yet incredible, dreadful … there’s no words to describe it. All feeling left my body. At that point, I was in shock.”

“Then I made the mistake of borrowing (someone’s) binoculars. .. I saw people jumping, which gave me nightmares for a week after, as you can imagine.” After the second tower fell, “I just lost it,” Saraceno said. “Started to cry. The power of what happened struck me. I ran into a friend, and we walked each other home.”"

Young and Northup followed the video with a two-person poem, with lines such as: “As we mourn together the great loss, we become one family.”

Laura Leis, Sisters High’s student body president, said she at first had wondered why there was a need to revisit the “twisted emotions that are with us every day.” But she said she came to realize there’s a need to “build upon past events with a renewed” sense of purpose: “It’s about valuing the freedom again.”

The student body vice president, C.J. Adam, ended the assembly with the words of Gandhi: “We must be the change we wish to see in others.”

Some of the students got a civics lesson of a different sort a short while later, as county commissioners held their weekly meeting at the school, answered questions and explained how county government affects their lives. (Students who will be 18 by Nov. 5 also were given voter registration cards).

Redmond: Planting a tree, reading the names

The city of Redmond held not one, but two ceremonies at Sam Johnson Park – one in the chilly early morning, to mark the time of the East Coast events, and another at midday.

“America will never be the same,” said Mayor Alan Unger, one of a small group of dignitaries flanked by two lines of police officers and firefighters. “America has chosen to fight back against terror, by facing evil with good. … I agree with the president. Look to your neighbor and help them have a quality of life.”

A color guard presented the flag before other speakers joined in, including parks Leslie Ann Smith, co-chairman of the parks commission, who said the American chestnut tree being planted this day was a living memorial: “As we watch it grow in coming months and years, let it remind us not only of what we lost, but what we gained: a renewed sense of patriotism and pride.”

After a moment of silence, police Lt. Al Maich played “Amazing Graze” on the bagpipes, an instrument he’s played (and taught others to play) for years.

Capt. Vern Arledge, Redmond’s fire and police chaplain, ran through the overwhelming statistics of 9/11, including the 3.1 million hours spent removing remains and tons upon tons of debris from Ground Zero. After the job was done, he said, “At least one worker is known to have committed suicide – he couldn’t stand what he’d seen in the past year.”

Statements of support from Gov. John Kitzhaber, Sens. Ron Wyden and Gordon Smith, and Rep. Greg Walden were read at both the sunrise and midday events. Participants also could view a list of names of the victims of the 9/11 attacks, on a “wall of remembrance.”

Rabbi David Rosenberg of Portland, president of the Board of Oregon Rabbis, attended and closed the Redmond event, saying the terrible events of 9/11 has shown the country won’t let its foes “destroy our character and who we are.”

Valerie Davis, standing under the shade of a nearby tree, held a small flag aloft during the ceremony. She later said the day “means many things” to her, in part because she originally was from the state of New York. Her son has been in the Navy for 13 years, and currently is aboard a Trident nuclear submarine, somewhere in the north Pacific.

“Those submarines are there for our protection,” Davis said.

Mike Van Meter, editor of the Bend Bugle, contributed to this story.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 11th, 2002 at 5:48 pm and is filed under Top Stories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.