Category: Event Listing Date: 2011-09-11
911 Memorial
Where Were You?
The question is often asked about a specific date or time of an important event, a famous person's birthday, a tragedy. Where were you? Unless it was of some significance you probably don't remember.
Where were you when Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin stepped onto the surface of the moon? The date was July 20th, 1969. If you are from South Dakota, especially Rapid City, you just may remember were you were when this city experienced the tragedy that was The Flood of 1972. Pretty historic events but it was the September 11 2001 attack on the World Trade Center in New York that touched so many lives and has become one of the most referenced events for the question, Where were you?
September 11, 2011 marked the 10th anniversary of the attack in New York City. In Rapid City, South Dakota a 9/11 Remembrance Ceremony took place on the grounds of Memorial Park. To reach the ceremony from the parking lot you walked by another special place, the site of two cement sections of the Berlin Wall.
Larry E. Connors, Retired Battalion Chief, FDNY was introduced by Master of Ceremonies, Mike Roesler, Retired Battalion Chief, Rapid City Fire Department. Mr. Connors spoke of the events of 9/11 and how it touched and affected the people of New York, and indeed the entire country. He spoke of Ira Olson, a local artist who created a carving that was delivered to New York after the attack.
Larry Connors concluded with the unveiling of a World Trade Center Memorial Steel I-Beam. It will be mounted on Granite along with descriptive plaques and become a permanent display in the Rapid City Civic Center.
Sometime in the future you will be asked, where were you on the 10th anniversary of the 9-11 attack? At Memorial Park in Rapid City South Dakota and Eric O'Connor, Piper, Rapid City Fire Department closed the program with Amazing Grace.