THAT FRANTIC 9/11 DAY!

Monday, September 15th, 2025
Baton Rouge, Louisiana

THAT FRANTIC 9/11 DAY!

I have watched through a window a world that has fallen.
– W. H. Auden

It has been twenty four years since terrorists attacked the Twinn Towers in New York City. I was there last week to commemorate this terrible event in America’s history.

The date, 9/11, turned into the frantic dialing of 911. A surreal feeling of shock and helplessness enveloped me back then as I watched the day’s events unfold. A friend called at home a little after 8:00 A.M. central time to tell me about the first plane’s crashing into the World Trade Center. Like millions of Americans, I turned on my television set just in time to see the second plane hit the second tower

I was home alone, so I immediately felt the need to call the people closest to me. I was able to reach my mother, my brother Jack, and my daughters Gentry and Meredith; I told them all to turn on their TV sets. I reached son James on his portable phone as he was entering the LSU Lab School.

But, what about my daughter Campbell? I knew she had flown back to Washington late the previous night from California, where she was reporting on the retirement of the president’s plane, a former Air Force One. Perhaps she was still home. I called her apartment but got no answer. Then the third plane hit the Pentagon in Washington. Thoughts raced through my head. Was there a fourth plane—or more? Wasn’t the White House a likely target? Was my oldest daughter sitting in her NBC office in the White House?

Her portable phone didn’t answer. I called the White House switchboard, which is noted for being efficient. There was a brief recording saying to hold on for an operator; then the line went dead. For a moment I feared the worst: a plane crashing into the White House, my daughter inside. Then I heard Matt Lauer on the “Today Show” say, “Now let’s go to Campbell Brown for an update across the street from the White House.” Campbell told a national audience that the White House had been evacuated and she was broadcasting from a nearby hotel. She gave hourly reports throughout the day and late into the evening.

After staying glued to the TV all day, Gladys and I kept a long-standing dinner date with friends at Chris’s steakhouse in Baton Rouge. Halfway through dinner, around 9:00 o’clock, my portable phone rang. It was son James. “Dad, I’m still watching everything on television,” he said. “I just need to do something. Do we have an American flag here at home?” I told him we had one stored in our “flag box,” where we keep banners for the various seasons, as well as holiday flags for Christmas, Halloween, and Easter. When Gladys and I drove into our driveway that night, a large American flag was hanging from the front porch, waving in the wind.

I felt it important that you hear of my observations on this anniversary. Prior to 9/11, life was so normal and ordinary. Since then, for many of us, life would never be the same.

Peace and Justice

Jim Brown

Jim Brown’s syndicated column appears each week in numerous newspapers throughout the nation and on websites worldwide. You can read all his past columns and see continuing updates at http://www.jimbrownla.com. You can also look over a list of books he has published at www.thelisburnpress.com.