Sept. 11 still stirs emotions

Last week our paper came out on Sept. 11, and as it does every year, that date stirs strong emotions in most everyone who was alive and old enough to remember the horrible scenes that unfolded Sept. 11, 2001.
If you indeed were old enough to remember what happened that day, it is one of those events that you remember exactly where you were when you first saw what was happening or heard what was going on. Some of us were at work. Some of us were getting ready for work. The horror that we witnessed was hard to process, and hard to put into words. Most of us were glued to our television sets for hours on end for the next weeks as we grappled with what had been done to us and how we were going to respond. For the first time since Pearl Harbor, a foreign enemy had attacked us on our own soil.
We remember the day well. We had only been in our new office for about three months. The day was a Tuesday. As we trudged into the office, well aware of what was happening, we immediately went to work to tell the story. For perhaps the only time in the newspaper’s history we put national news across the top of that week’s issue of the Chronicle. We redid our Question of the Week to get people’s reaction to what they were seeing. It was still shoulder tourism season, but the town was quiet. It was somber. Everyone felt profound sadness for all of the innocent people that had lost their lives at the hands of suicidal terrorists who used our own airports and airplanes to attack us.
The 24-hour format of news made it so we were pounded with the information about the attacks around the clock, from moments after the attack to the years that followed as we tried to hunt down those responsible. Who can forget the image of George Bush, sitting in a Florida classroom, having a staff member whisper in his ear the United States had been attacked? Who can forget the sight of the towers crumbling to the ground? Who can forget the sight of humans jumping out of the towers to their death, choosing to die that way that rather than be burned alive by the inferno in the towers? Who can forget Todd Beamer saying “Let’s roll” as the brave passengers of Flight 93 decided they would not go down without a fight, rushing their hijackers and fighting them until the plane went down into a field near Shanksville, Pa.?
Out of the unbelievable tragedy, however, there were some positives. On Sept. 12, 2001, there were no Republicans, no Democrats, no fighting. We were all Americans. The country was united in a way it had not been in countless years, and we had the backing of virtually every country on the planet. The sight of all the American flags and collective resolve of the country was truly a sight to behold. We don’t long for that tragedy, but we long for that unity. In Custer, residents marched dressed in patriotic garb and broke into a rousing chant of “USA...USA...USA.”
Sept. 11, 2001. We will never forget.