Long Island 9/11 Vignettes

POINT LOOKOUT

Retired FDNY firefighter Bob Beckwith, who stood with President George W. Bush on a crushed fire truck and pile of debris at Ground Zero in 2001, went to Point Lookout Sunday rather than to the site of that iconic image.

Beckwith, a Baldwin resident, said he chose the Long Island ceremony over Lower Manhattan because no first responders were invited to the Ground Zero memorial. President Barack Obama invited him to the Manhattan ceremony, Beckwith said, but he declined because he did not lose any family members.

"I know a lot of people that came here , that's why I came," Beckwith, 79, said as he toured the Town of Hempstead memorial with his wife, Barbara. Tears ran down his cheeks as he held a white carnation in one hand and used the other to shake hands with the many people walking up to him.

"I don't like the word 'closure.' We will never get closure," he said. "I want everybody to never forget, and to pray for the survivors."

Beckwith said he ended up in the photograph with Bush by chance -- he was at the site working with other first responders and just happened to be near the president.

He was to meet later Sunday with Bush, Beckwith said, declining to provide details.

-- AISHA AL-MULSIM

SADDLE ROCK

To some, it was graffiti or litter.

To Saddle Rock's mayor at the time, J. Leonard Samansky, the messages, notes, candles and pictures left on the village bridge constituted a living memorial.

In the days after Sept. 11, 2001, residents and loved ones flocked to the bridge, the only public place in Saddle Rock to look across the water to Lower Manhattan and Ground Zero. Notes scrawled in English, Hebrew and Farsi -- speaking of faith and resilience -- covered the bridge.

Some residents wanted it painted over, said Adam Samansky, son of J. Leonard Samansky, who died in July after 22 years in office. "He viewed it differently," Adam Samansky said. "It wasn't graffiti defacing a bridge; it was an outpouring of support."

The elder Samansky brought in a professional photographer to chronicle all of the items and messages left behind.

On that day 10 years ago, residents stood on the Saddle Rock bridge staring into Manhattan.

Laurie Avelar was there. Chris Campbell was there, too. So was Raymond Plakstis.

"It was glowing," said Avelar, 61.

"You saw the towers burning," said Campbell, 49. "People had come out here before the second one hit. They were just in awe."

Plakstis, a first assistant chief with the Great Neck Alert Fire Department, planned Sunday's memorial service on the bridge, since renamed the 9/11 Memorial Bridge. It attracted more than 300 people.

"This was the place where this community rallied to support each other and cry their eyes out," said Adam Samansky, an attorney in Boston.

-- EMILY C. DOOLEY

MELVILLE

Sept. 11 brought Carl Peyser home.

Ten years ago, he was at work at his communications job for a real estate firm at Penn Station, Peyser said. He spoke yesterday before the Melville Fire Department's anniversary ceremony he helped plan to honor the 43 people from Huntington who died that day.

A trained emergency medical technician, he ran to a nearby firehouse and joined a seven-man crew headed to the trade center. The firefighters all raced to the first tower. Peyser headed west to a medical triage area.

He looked up and saw people jumping from buildings, an unimaginable sight. He spent the day treating people injured in the attack and its aftermath. Later, Peyser learned that each of the seven firefighters he had joined had died in the first tower.

"It was an overwhelming feeling of helplessness," he said.

The images of that day haunted him. He spent days just watching television. The stress, he said, broke up his marriage.

But the experience also served as a reawakening of sorts. Peyser, 57, had grown up in Melville, but moved away. After his divorce, he remarried and moved back to his hometown. He soon joined the fire department.

Peyser initially thought he was too old to be of much use, but he found he could help train younger members.

Now, he said, "I don't have that feeling of helplessness anymore."

-- SANDRA PEDDIE

ROCKVILLE CENTRE

Bishop William Murphy arrived on Long Island as spiritual head of the Diocese of Rockville Centre five days before 9/11. On the morning of the terrorist attacks, he was sitting in his fifth-floor office and saw the second jet hit the World Trade Center.

Sunday, he recalled the shock he felt that day, and how he instructed all the Catholic hospitals in the diocese to put themselves "at the disposal of the city, thinking that there would be injured. Unfortunately, there weren't even people injured."

That night, Murphy went to Mercy Medical Center in Rockville Centre to donate blood, but the staff would not take his for at least an hour, he said in an interview Sunday, because his blood pressure was so high.

At Sunday's 11 a.m. Mass at St. Agnes Cathedral in Rockville Centre, Murphy delivered a homily in which he spoke of America's pain, but also of its healing and hope since 9/11.

"The great sin of those who perpetrated this assault on our country and this massacre of innocent life was that they were motivated by hatred to destroy the innocent," Murphy said. " . . . We must never become like them . . . As Paul reminds us we do not overcome evil with evil; we overcome evil only with good."

During the Prayer of the Faithful, as the names of the 22 people from Rockville Centre who perished in the attacks were read aloud, the cathedral's bells tolled mournfully.

-- BART JONES

WESTBURY

Manuel J. DaMota III awoke early Sunday and went to his LEGO set.

Out of red and white LEGOS, DaMota built a model of the World Trade Center towers, with small yellow pieces representing people.

Inside, on the top floor, he placed a single yellow LEGO piece. It represented his father, Manuel J. DaMota, who was in the trade center for a meeting and died in the attack. His wife, Barbara, was pregnant with Manuel at the time.

"I never got to see the World Trade Center, not even my dad," said Manuel, 9, from Valley Stream.

And so, knowing this was the 10th anniversary of the attack, Manuel built the LEGO towers and took them to Holy Rood Cemetery in Westbury, where his father is buried.

"I want to put it on my dad's rock," said Manuel, wearing a T-shirt with his father's picture on it and clutching his creation, complete with a tall antenna perched on one tower.

"I tried to make it bigger, but I just didn't have any more of the windows," Manuel said. "I think he would like it," he said of his father, a project manager with Bronx Builders.

No speeches or tributes were planned for Section 29 of the cemetery, where more than 70 Catholic Long Island victims of the attacks are buried. Their headstones surround a Pieta sculpture and a large granite block, bearing their names.

At least 15 friends and family came to see DaMota's grave. They share a common dream, Manuel said.

"I know everybody wishes to see one more time the people lost on this day," he said.

-- EMILY C. DOOLEY

POINT LOOKOUT

The Hempstead Town 9/11 memorial couldn't have been located at a better place for the family of William V. Steckman.

Just after sunrise, Donna Steckman and her family went out to the anniversary ceremony at the memorial in Point Lookout to remember and celebrate the life of her father. William Steckman, 56, of West Hempstead, was a transmitter engineer for NBC for 35 years. He was working on the 104th floor at One World Trade Center 10 years ago.

"Growing up we used to go to this beach with him, so we have a connection to this place," said Donna Steckman, 44, of Massapequa, who held back tears as she remembered her father. She and her sisters, Deanine Nagengast, 41, of Seaford and Diana DeVito, 34, of Merrick, joined more than 3,000 people at the memorial.

They placed small American flags bearing their father's name in the sand at the base of a chrome replica of the Twin Towers.

"Even after 10 years, it's still very hard for us," DeVito said as she began to cry. "We are a close family and we try to honor him as much as we can."

- AISHA AL-MUSLIM

ROSLYN

Michael Stanger, a rabbi at Old Westbury Hebrew Congregation, went to a large interfaith service in Roslyn carrying what he called one of the few known Jewish symbols forged from World Trade Center wreckage.

The blackened, rusted piece of steel, shaped like the Star of David, was smaller than the tray of cookies on the table behind him. But the rabbi hoped it would be a powerful reminder of unity during a program that included discussions by area Muslim, Jewish and Christian leaders at Temple Sinai of Roslyn.

"There were a lot of crosses, but this is unique," Stanger said, noting that the steel was provided by a congregation member whose husband was a first responder working after the attack. "It shows that we can recreate."

Organizers of the interfaith remembrance created eight discussion groups for the wide range of religious leaders gathered and encouraged the several hundred attendees to go to a session from a faith that wasn't their own.

Maybe that's why, as the talks were set to begin, the room reserved for the Islamic Center of Long Island and Muslim Society of East Meadow had by far the largest crowd, to the point where people sat on tables and a piano as organizers scrambled to find more chairs.

-- PAUL LAROCCO

VALLEY STREAM

Maria Diaz of Valley Stream watched the twin towers fall from three blocks away. Her husband worked in one of them. The couple, both 40, now use Sept. 11 to celebrate their lives after surviving the attacks and for honoring those killed.

They were among more than 1,000 people gathered at Sunday's ceremony in the Memorial Garden of A.J. Hendrickson Park in Valley Stream.

"I am here to support those that lost their loved ones in my community Valley Stream and elsewhere," said Maria Diaz. Ten years ago, she was in a job training seminar at HSBC International. She still remembers seeing both towers smoking, then collapsing, she said

"I recall when the second plane hit, we just looked at each other and said, 'Oh my God. It is a terrorist attack,' " said Maria Diaz, who burst into tears. "It was mayhem and confusion."

Her husband, Edwin Diaz, who worked in One World Trade Center for Lehman Brothers, was running late to work that morning. He got stuck in the subway and it wasn't until he exited the West 4th Street train station that he realized what had happened.

"It was pretty traumatic," Edwin Diaz said. "Fortunately for me, I was stuck in the train."

-- AISHA AL-MUSLIM

BETHPAGE

Donna Hickey of Bethpage -- whose firefighter husband Brian died in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks -- began Sunday as she does every anniversary of that horrific day.

She went to church.

Donna Hickey, 57, said she appreciates the memorials and events that community groups schedule for victims such as herself, but what she really wants on Sept. 11 is to be around family and community.

"With strangers, you're just one among many. When you're with your family, everybody loved Brian," she said.

Brian Hickey was a captain with the FDNY's Rescue 4 of Woodside at the time he died. He celebrated his 20th anniversary with the department on Sept. 5, 2001. He was also a volunteer in the Bethpage Fire Department.

One of Brian and Donna Hickey's four children, Daniel, 33, is now a firefighter with Ladder 126 in Jamaica, a company for which Brian once served as a lieutenant.

Donna Hickey went to memorial services during the week, including a Friday night ceremony at the Nassau County Firefighters Museum where her husband was honored. She called the ceremony "absolutely beautiful" -- and added that it was just as meaningful that Brian's name was mentioned in today's church service at St. Martin of Tours in Bethpage.

Hickey attended church Sunday with longtime friend Coleen Colleluori, whose husband Joseph -- an FDNY lieutenant who worked at Ground Zero after the attacks -- died of cancer in 2007. The two later attended a gathering of about 30 family members and friends.

"It doesn't go away ever," she said. "I have to surround myself with the people that I know -- people who better knew Brian and I."

-- PATRICK WHITTLE

SOUTHAMPTON

Wearing a "Gone But Not Forgotten" commemorative T-shirt to Southampton's 9-11 memorial dedication Sunday, civil engineer Wayne Moore talked about the time he spent "on the pile" during the recovery effort following the attacks. Moore was there as part of the New York National Guard's 106th Air Rescue Wing, based at Gabreski Airport in Westhampton Beach.

What he remembers, Moore said, were the people coming up to him with pictures of lost loved ones, asking whether he had seen them. "That was the thing that bothered me the most," he said.

Moore's unit stayed at the site for 10 days. He retired five years ago.

Moore sat on bleachers in front of the Southampton firehouse Sunday as bagpipers played Amazing Grace, and tears flowed as freely as the waterfall running through a piece of steel from the World Trade Center that anchored the memorial.

With his family, he listened to speakers at the ceremony talking about a moment in history he knows personally, honoring the history in which he played a part.

"I thought I should be here," he said.

-- STACEY ALTHERR

BABYLON TOWN

Ten years later, the emotions are still raw.

Despite a cool breeze and graying skies, people lingered Sunday along the walkway of Babylon Town's Sept. 11 memorial, located on a sandy stretch between Overlook and Cedar Beaches, after the town's ceremony marking the 10th anniversary.

They cried, hugged or simply stood silently, as they gazed at the black granite plaques memorializing the 48 people from Babylon who died that day.

Few wanted to talk. A firefighter standing sentry at the ceremony said, "Now is not a good time." Others were too consumed with their own private grief to pull away from the plaques.

"This is a very bad year for them," said town Councilwoman Ellen T. McVeety, who, with the families, helped plan the memorial. "Maybe because it's a landmark year."

While words were an effort, the plaques -- each one engraved with pictures and remembrances selected by the families -- had been carefully tended. They were lovingly adorned with beach pebbles, flowers and flags. In front of one was a toy beach shovel. Before another, golf balls.

Even those who did not lose loved ones in the terrorist attacks said they found themselves moved by the memorial's poignancy and the beauty of the beach setting.

Steve Markham, of Babylon, said he had come to support those who lost loved ones. "People are, in their own way, remembering."

-- SANDRA PEDDIE

ST. JAMES

James Flynn of Smithtown Sunday lifted his children, Hayley, 9, and Logan, 6, so they could touch the 7-ton piece of World Trade Center steel at the new 9/11 memorial in St. James.

Then James Flynn choked up, unable to speak as he recalled city firefighter Carl Bedigian, who had lived near his office in College Point, Queens. Bedigian, 35, left his home after learning of the attack on the Twin Towers, Flynn said.

"He was off-duty that day. He went in to save people there and he never came back," Flynn said. "That's a real New York City firefighter."

Following a ceremony dedicating the memorial, dozens of people tossed stones over a 2-foot-high stone wall surrounding the steel. Some placed flowers, saluted or made the sign of the cross.

The steel reminded Maryann Flynn, James' wife, of watching the towers fall 10 years ago.

"I wanted to touch that steel in disbelief that it's standing there," she said.

The Flynn children weren't born when the towers fell.

"We want them to remember what it means for them and our country," Maryann Flynn said. "We want them to be better people."

-- CARL MACGOWAN

MILLER PLACE

Anthony Flammia, like other responders, was not invited to Ground Zero yesterday. So he stayed home in Miller Place and watched his daughters do cartwheels on the front lawn.

"I would rather be there with my family," he said of the ceremonies in Lower Manhattan. "It's frustrating, and frankly absurd, that we weren't invited. It's disrespectful."

An NYPD highway officer, Flammia was on the scene moments after the first plane hit, watching as the bodies of jumpers hit the pavement. He was assigned to bring bodies to the makeshift morgue on-site and to the medical examiner's office. Later, he was responsible for bringing Long Island victims' families to the bereavement center at One Police Plaza in Manhattan.

When he took a job with the Centre Island Police Department in Nassau County in December 2001, he didn't think he would suffer any lasting effects. "I thought I had beat it," he said.

But one night, he uncharacteristically fell asleep during an overnight shift, and Nassau police had to break in to his car to wake him, he said. Loud noises made him jump. He found himself getting easily agitated. In February 2007, he responded to a house fire in Bayville but didn't remember rescuing two victims. He sought help at the World Trade Center Monitoring Program, and was diagnosis with post-traumatic stress disorder and myriad medical issues. In 2008, he said, he was forced to retire.

His wife, pregnant with triplets on 9/11, miscarried two of the babies. Their daughter Gianna, now 9, was born with severe mental handicaps.

"I'm physically exhausted, my family's physically exhausted," he said. "Despite everything, I would do it again in a heartbeat."

-- STACEY ALTHERR