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Mostly Cloudy East Rockaway hosts solemn 9/11 ceremonies
Village observes 10th anniversary of terrorist attacks
Residents, village officials, firefighters, veterans’ organizations members, Boy Scout troops and World Trade Center first responders gathered at East Rockaway’s Memorial Park on Sunday to observe the 10th anniversary of the 9 /11 terrorist attacks. This was the village’s 11th ceremony, the first having
been held in the park just days after the attacks. Village Trustee Richard Gogarty was the master of ceremonies.
“Ten years ago today, everything changed,” said speaker Rabbi Andrew Warmflash of the Hewlett-East Rockway Jewish Centre. “The world as we know it ceased to be … now we know that a handful of people with murderous intent can kill 3,000 people. Yes, everything changed — but nothing changed. Our enemies sought to demoralize us and destroy us, but we rose to the challenge ... we came together as a community.
“We are still a good people, a compassionate people, a generous people,” Warmflash added. “Our enemies sought to change everything, but they changed nothing. And so the battle will go on.”
The program included inspirational words from local officials, bagpipes played by Brendan McMillan, and a reading of the names of local people who lost their lives on 9/11. As the victims’ names were read aloud by Village Foundation President Theresa Gaffney, firefighters placed a single rose next to each memorial stone marker.
First responder James Lapenna was working as an electrician in New Jersey when he looked up and saw the towers on fire across the Hudson River. He jumped in his car and drove to Manhattan, and was one of those who pulled two Port Authority officers out of the rubble — one of whom survived. He helped search for what he hoped would be survivors for the next 12 hours, side by side with firefighters.
At the East Rockaway ceremony, Lapenna recited the poem “The Paradox of our Time,” attributed to Dr. Bob Moorehead, which read, in part, “The paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings, but shorter tempers; wider freeways, but narrower viewpoints; we spend more, but have less; we talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often. We’ve learned how to make a living, but not a life; we‘ve added years to life, not life to years.”
