Jackson County Historical Society

Educational Resources

Jackson County Counts – Counting America’s Stories One By One

A Journal Entry from September 11, 2001

By David W. Jackson

Early this Tuesday morning while we were busy at work at the Historical Society, word began to spread through our offices that an airplane had collided with one of the towering buildings of the World Trade Center on Manhattan Island in New York. What an awful accident, we thought.

Moments later, I received a call from our administrative office--located across the street from the old Independence Square Courthouse where I work--that radio news reported another commercial jet plane crashed into the second tower; that both buildings were burning; that people had been seen plummeting to their death from more than 100 stories in what quickly became known as a deliberate terrorist attack.

I dropped what I was doing and by the time I reached the administrative office to listen to the radio, our assistant Claire Graham-McDonnell told me they were speculating that a third jet-bombed into the Pentagon in Washington D.C. As we listened, a fourth plane was reported to have crashed to the ground in Ohio or Pennsylvania.

“What next?” we thought. This was so surreal and so sudden.

None of us could concentrate, and because we felt guilty conducting business during such a horrific time, our executive director Jim Giles agreed with us that we should just go home. Just about that time Jackson County ordered the Courthouse closed, and my coworker Janet Russell and our volunteers in that morning—Martha McBroome and Henry Marnett—left for home.

I drove home my usual route from the Independence Square, west on 23^rd street and south on I-435 to Gregory Boulevard exit. I arrived home within 20 minutes and have been riveted to the television ALL DAY. I can hardly believe the calamity of the morning’s events. I guess it’s shock.

I had been to Manhattan for an excursion one day when I visited friends (former high school classmates) in Pennsylvania around 1989. One of several taxi-cab rides we took that day drove by the World Trade Center, but we did not get out. Actually, the car ride was like an amusement park ride because the “cabbie” drove rather fast through the crowded streets and dodged other cars and pedestrians (or rather, they dodged us!). It must have been raining, because we could see water gushing as cars were driving by a certain spot in the road ahead of us. We got our windows up JUST IN TIME as a deluge of water came crashing against the taxi’s windows. We were all laughing hysterically.

STILL, I had NO recollection of the sheer size of those two towers. As the news media re-capped the mornings terrorist attacks, I lay in bed simply stunned at how the World Trade Center dwarfed all other surrounding buildings. Within a matter of hours, her skyline was forever changed, as were countless lives.

September 11, 2001. I cannot imagine what could possibly happen next as this saga unfolds. If you are reading, you must surely have an idea. Our prayers are with you.