It’s educational. It’s worthy. It’s heart-wrenching. It’s overwhelming.
Last fall, I had the fortunate opportunity to visit the 9/11 Memorial Museum in New York. Located in lower Manhattan next to the glimmering sun-soaked new One World Trade Center, the museum was surrounded by a plaza dotted with swamp white oaks. Nestled inside the street-level urban forest were two reflecting pools, representing the toppled Twin Towers, which once scraped the sky. (I stood on the observation deck of the Twin Towers as a sixth-grader). These twin “Reflecting Absence” pools, each with 30-foot cascading waterfalls that drop into the ground, served as dominant, yet modest expression of the emptiness that resulted from the country’s painful loss on Sept. 11, 2001.
The horrific nature of that day was evident on the faces of fellow countrymen grieving over the multitude of names inscribed on angled bronze walls surrounding both reflecting pools. Simply viewing the names of those who perished that day, before entering the museum space, was sobering.
After obtaining a museum ticket and walking through security, similar to entering an airport, I descended a ramp past ruins of a concrete staircase that survivors used to escape the terrorist attack. On the ground floor, I found separate historical and memorial exhibits.
Contained in the memorial display, located directly below where the South Tower once stood, the 2,983 men, women, and children killed in September 2001 and February 1993 were honored with individual portraits on the “Wall of Faces.” Nearby, visitors searched the names of their loves ones via touchscreen tables. The space also featured a darkened inner chamber, where the names of victims and intermittent biographical snippets from family and loved ones were broadcast overhead. I sat there in silence for what seemed like an eternity.
Past a crumbled New York Fire Department ladder truck, upon entering the historical exhibit, directly below the footprint of the North Tower, visitors were reminded that no photographs were allowed. I quickly understood the importance of the request when confronting scores of memorabilia on display. Behind glass, I came close to personal artifacts, including a wristwatch and a pair of eyeglasses, recovered from the site as people huddled together and wept. And shielded from public view – tucked in a small corner complete with a warning to visitors – disturbing images of people jumping to their deaths were on display, rotating. All the while, real-time audio recordings from first responder radio chatter played over ceiling speakers as a reminder of the tragedy that unfolded on that dreadful day.
Both exhibits, located at bedrock seven stories underground, were short strolls away from the museum’s Foundation Hall. The colossal room contained what was described as the “slurry wall,” a retaining partition from the original World Trade Center. Nigh to the wall rested the “Last Column,” a 36-foot-tall concrete support covered with missing posters and inscriptions placed by rescue workers.
In the grand hall, visitors were also allowed to forever become a part of the living museum. Via several electronic tablets, I too wrote a message and contributed my voice to the museum’s archive, which then appeared on the slurry wall.
The experience was intense. And although I was grateful for the experience, after about four hours inside the reflective 9/11 Memorial Museum, the weight of sadness was unbearable. I left. It’s an experience that I won’t forget.
tbaker@cortezjournal.com