Memorial Services to Honor Local Residents Fallen on September 11th

Local residents will have an opportunity to honor those who perished in the tragic attacks on 9/11 with two memorial services in Livingston and in West Orange. The Livingston 9/11 memorial service will begin at 7 p.m. “Essex County Remembers,” a solemn ceremony at the Essex County Eagle Rock September 11th Memorial that will mark the 13th anniversary of the tragedies in New York, Washington, DC, and Pennsylvania will also be held on Thursday.

Livingston Boy Scouts will serve as honor guards and lead the “Pledge of Allegiance” which will be followed by the Livingston High School Chorus, directed by Joshua Salzman, singing the National Anthem. The chorus will also sing “Let There be Peace on Earth,” “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” and “God Bless America” during the program.

Following the invocation by Rabbi E. Samuel Klibanoff of Congregation Etz Chaim, Mayor Michael Rieber will explain the meaning of the garden as well as describe a new and extremely important addition to this ceremony. This year, the hand-out program will include biographies of those whose lives were taken on that tragic day in September 2001. Bunnie Ratner, chairperson of the ceremony realized that although their names were read as well as inscribed on the monument, it did not really tell who these men were. “These seven loved ones are so much more than just a list of names. Once you know who they were, you will truly understand the depth of the loss that was and is still felt and why Livingston conducts this Ceremony of Remembrance each and every year.

Township Manager Michele Meade will read a poem and include brief passages from the biographies. Brian Boyle, a Vietnam Veteran, will toll a bell in honor of each man lost, and Livingston Girl Scouts will place white roses on the Garden’s center monument, a steel beam from Ground Zero which supports a sundial and plaques marking the times and locations of the four terrorist attacks. Buried beneath the monument is Sacred Soil removed from the World Trade Center site.

Family members and guests are invited to share their thoughts at this time.

After the benediction by Reverend Thomas P. Nydegger of St. Philomena’s Church, Tim Griffin and his daughter Gabrielle will play taps. The ceremony concludes with the audience being requested to stand and join the chorus singing “God Bless America”.

Mrs. Ratner feels that this ceremony is like the garden itself, “It’s welcoming, it’s sincere, it’s beautiful and it’s heartwarming. It is a time to reflect on the past and, by having youthful participants for much of the program, it offers hope for the future.”

Parking will be available at ST. Philomena’s Church.

For more information, contact Liliana Branquinho at 973-535-7925 ext 260 or lbranquinho@Livingstnnj.org.

About the Essex County Memorial Service

“After the attacks, people spontaneously came to Eagle Rock Reservation to view the tragedy unfold at the Twin Towers and leave cards, letters, photos and flowers in an impromptu memorial in honor of their loved ones,” Essex County Executive Joseph N. DiVincenzo, Jr.

“I knew immediately that this was the natural location for a memorial because of the public attraction to this site and the unparalleled view of the World Trade Center from the lookout area. Our September 11th Memorial is a special place for people to come for solace and comfort because of its unique location and its powerful message of peace and hope,” DiVincenzo added.

A brief program with family members who lost a loved one in the tragedies, elected officials and clergy members from diverse religious faiths will be held at 8 a.m. Memorial wreaths will be laid at the monument and a new American flag will be raised. A string quartet will perform reverent selections of music at the memorial site after the ceremony until 2 p.m.

“We must never forget the importance of this day and remember all those who lost their lives,” DiVincenzo, Jr. added. “I encourage everyone to take time out of their day to mark the 11th anniversary of September 11th and visit this revered site.”

The Essex County Eagle Rock September 11th Memorial was dedicated in October 2002, just over a year after the attacks. Its many elements pay tribute to the men and women, police officers, firefighters and other first responders who lost their lives at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, in Pennsylvania and aboard the four airplanes that crashed that day. It was the only 9/11 memorial to list all 3,000 victims’ names until 2011 when the World Trade Center Memorial was dedicated. In 2009, the Essex County 9/11 Memorial was expanded to include a monument honoring the 33 flight crew members aboard the four airplanes that crashed.

In 2011, a 7,400-pound steel and concrete artifact from the World Trade Center foundation was installed at the site and a bronze plaque was dedicated to honor emergency medical technicians who responded to Ground Zero and those who provided aid to people returning from New York across the Hudson River.

Local Essex county 9/11 memorials are listed below:

Nutley built a small garden with a steel beam recovered from Ground Zero and a plaque to memorialize those who were killed on Sept. 11.

Bloomfield has a plaque dedicated to the three residents at the base of a flag pole in a local park.

Montclair High School hosts the town’s 9/11 memorial which features a steel beam recovered from the World Trade Center.

Glen Ridge also constructed a memorial at the town’s high school, which features a tree and an engraved stone.

East Newark built a memorial a borough hall with a granite marker featuring an image of the World Trade Center.

Information on the Livingston memorial service courtesy of the Township of Livingston.