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Teaching 9/11 to Teenagers Too Young to Remember
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There was the moment a few months before the attacks, when the two brothers met for a quick lunch near the World Trade Center and idled at the base of the North Tower. Harvey mentioned the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. "Look at this thing," he said, gazing up the shimmering face of the tower. "They'll never take these buildings down."
Or the moment a few days after the attacks, when Gardner sat at his computer and created a missing-person flier. Name: Harvey J. Gardner III. Age: 35. Hair color: black. At the bottom of the sheet, under a photograph, he typed a physical description -- "Hairline receding" -- and then imagined how furious Harvey would be if he ever read it.
Or the moment later that first week, hope fading now, when Gardner stopped by his brother's house and sifted through toiletries, collecting a razorblade and a toothbrush to provide rescue workers a sample of Harvey's DNA.
Eight years? Could it really be that long? In that time, Gardner began a marriage, struggled to have children, celebrated the birth of a first baby, then a second, then a third. He changed careers three times and returned to school for two new degrees. And yet still he suffered from nightmares and wondered if he had post-traumatic stress disorder.
A few years ago, Gardner's oldest daughter asked him about Sept. 11, and he realized how vague the event must have seemed to her. She needed to remember, he decided. Everyone needed to remember. He helped form the Sept. 11 Education Trust, which conducted 100 hours of video interviews with survivors, firefighters, politicians and relatives of the victims. The videos formed the backbone for a curriculum intended to "remind everyone that 9/11 was a collective experience, affecting everyone, everywhere," Gardner said.
With the help of history professors at the Taft Institute for Government at Queens College, Gardner developed a seven-lesson curriculum intended for sixth through 12th grades. He spoke at a news conference in New York on Tuesday to mark the release of the curriculum, recalling eight anniversaries of the attacks. First it was mourned, then memorialized, then made into history for future generations and shipped to a high school in Indiana.
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JaLeah Hedrick, 18, had never learned about Sept. 11 in school until she entered Hutchison's class this week, but consequences of that day surrounded her as she began her pursuit of extra credit. For Hedrick, Sept. 11 was the pledge of allegiance that Vincennes area schools had begun playing over loudspeakers every morning since late 2001. It was the "Threat Level Orange" that she heard each time she visited the Indianapolis airport. It was the way her grandfather, a World War II veteran, grimaced when he spoke of "those Muslims." It was the USA T-shirt her dad wore when he picked her up from school in an aging Pontiac with a red-white-and-blue license plate inscribed with the phrase "In God We Trust."
And now, it was homework -- due to Hutchison by 1 p.m. Friday.
Hedrick wanted to interview her grandfather Ed Hedrick, because he is a veteran and, she said, "an American hero." Other classmates were planning to interview fathers serving in Iraq or distant relatives who had worked at the Pentagon, but Ed Hedrick, 83, was the only person his granddaughter knew whose recollections of Sept. 11 might have the gravitas worthy of extra credit.
She rode a mile across town and sat across from her grandfather on his front porch. She pulled a blue notebook and a pink pen from her backpack and then looked at a class handout that provided a list of possible interview questions. "I have to ask you some of these for homework," she told her grandfather, her eyes still fixed on the sheet. "Where were you when you first heard about the attack?"
"I was sitting in that red chair over there in the living room," he said.
She nodded and then read the next question. "Did you continue to listen to the radio or watch TV?"
"Yes," her grandfather said. "I barely moved all week. I couldn't stop watching."
"How did it affect you?" she asked.
"Severe anger, for days," he said.
"What action did you want the government to take?" she asked.
"Well, I guess I wanted them to load up three or four of those H-bombs and send them over there. That's how I felt at the time."
"How has it affected your daily life since?"
"Not much. I don't think about it. They teach you not to think about ugly things when you fight in a war."
Hedrick had a full page of pink notes now, enough for a good start on the assignment. She thanked her grandfather and patted him on the knee. He stood up with her, a distant look in his eyes. "I was born into a war, I fought in a war, and now here's another war," he said. "You might not know it to look at me now, but when I was 18 they made me walk 25 miles with 70 pounds on my back."
"I know, Grandpa," Hedrick said. "I know."
He looked ready to tell her more, but his granddaughter was already heading into the house, the door swinging behind her. She had heard this story before. She remembered it. It was history. So she walked off the porch, carrying the class handouts on Sept. 11, and returned home to finish her assignment.