Harvest America CUES BLOG

This is a day, as we all well know, that will always be remembered. September 11, 2001 was a day that changed all of our lives forever, a day when evil seemed to win over good. Each of us remembers where we were on that day and what we were doing. I was in a meeting when an administrative assistant stepped in to say that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. Each of us thought that this was likely a small private plane that went astray and proceeded with the meeting. A few moments later the same administrative assistant stepped in to say that a second plane had crashed into the Towers. We were first in shock as our thoughts immediately went to our own families and then to those who we worked with. It was quite a few hours, as the day unfolded, before were were able to grasp what was happening. I was a teacher and after calling my wife and children, turned to our students to counsel them and help to make sense of what was transpiring. Was this the beginning of the end? Who was responsible for this and how far reaching will this event become over the next few hours, days, weeks?

I would later find out that one of my former students, Chris Carstangen was on the second plane that crashed into the Towers. My heart broke for his family and friends. America, of course, acted and reacted bringing our country to a place that we would not have dreamed: 12 years of war trying to find an answer and prevent this from happening again on our soil.

As we remember that fateful day I felt that it was important to reflect on one group of people who suffered and then united as a result of 9/11. When the planes hit the Towers, one of America’s great restaurants fell target to this unthinkable attack on innocent people. Seventy-nine employees of Windows on the World Restaurant died on that day in 2001. They were serving breakfast and preparing for another beautiful day overlooking Manhattan. Chef Lomomaco, through a twist of fate, was delayed in arriving at work that morning while he was getting his eye glasses repaired. As he began his trip up through the Towers, the first plane hit and diverted people on to the street. He watched in horror as his restaurant burst into flames and the Towers eventually collapsed. Seventy-nine beautiful people who were his co-workers and friends lost their lives, leaving behind families and friends of their own.

Kevin Zraly was the director of the Windows on the World Wine School and shared in Chef Lomonaco’s grief and deep sense of loss. He too lost his friends and colleagues.

In the days that followed, restaurant workers, chefs and restaurant owners from NYC and around the country descended on Ground Zero to help feed the hundreds of firemen, police, and other volunteers who were sifting through the rubble looking for survivors and recovering those who lost their lives. It was what restaurant people do. It was the one way that we all know how to help and give some small sense of relief to those who were stunned, but committed to the awful task of recovery.

It took many years, but the New York landscape is returning to a sense of normalcy, restaurants have come and gone, but the food scene is once again vibrant, the 9/11 memorial is scheduled for an opening in the near future, and fundraisers have collected money to help the families of the restaurant workers who lost their lives on that day in 2001.

Today we remember all of the nearly 3,000 who lost their lives on 9/11, the subsequent thousands who lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan fighting to make sense of these events, and especially those innocent restaurant employees who only wanted to make great food, serve the public, and bring a smile to the face of those who could view Manhattan from the top of the world.

We will never forget.