For a Younger Generation, 9/11 Evokes Memories of Classroom, Confusion

For Millennials, the 9/11 attack is remembered in the same way as Generation X remembers the Challenger disaster. The Boston Globe

By Roberto Scalese

September 11, 2014

3 minutes to read

For many Americans, the attack on September 11, 2001 still feels fresh, especially for those directly touched by the horror of that day. They can recount where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news. Whether they were getting ready for work, dropping off the kids at school, or traveling themselves, there’s near instant recall when anyone talks about September 11.

After 13 years, however, there are some adults who have a different set of memories. Those people are finishing college and entering the work force. For them, the 9/11 memories feel and sound like what Generation X remembers about the Challenger disaster, or Baby Boomers remember about the Kennedy Assassination. They experienced a true national tragedy at a time when they were just learning how to handle the depth of feeling the day evoked.

In 1986, I was in the third grade, and our teacher, Mrs. Rich, had rolled in a television so we could watch the Challenger launch. Fortunately in my class, she was able to turn off the television pretty quickly after the explosion, before the reality sank into our 8-year-old minds. She told us that the launch was over and we were moving on to a new topic. We were a little confused, but never discussed what happened in class. It wasn’t until I got home later that day, and my parents were watching the news, that I realized what exactly had happened.

Boston.com asked some of its younger news room staffers to share their memories of Sept. 11, and their stories were remarkably similar to my own experience with the Challenger disaster:

Ellen O’Leary

On September 11, 2001, I was in fourth grade. That morning I remember hearing my classmate ask, “Mrs. O’Toole, did you know there was a plane crash in New York?’’ and she replied that she had heard, and that it was very sad. “Hm, a plane crashed,’’ I thought. I wondered if the pilot had fallen asleep or had gotten lost. It didn’t occur to me that people had died, I was busy imagining the inflatable slides and oxygen masks I heard about on flights to visit my grandparents.

Throughout the day, I didn’t notice that the smile on Mrs. O’Toole’s face looked forced. I didn’t pay attention to the hurried whispers of teachers in the hallways. When I got home that afternoon, my mom sat on our couch watching the news, crying. The television screen was over-bright with flames and flashing sirens. I asked if this was still about the plane crash, still not grasping what had happened. She tried to explain the attacks, but even her tempered version of events made little sense to me. I guess acts of terrorism have no place in the mind of a 9-year-old.

Over the next few weeks, I noticed my parents watching the news more often. At recess, my friends and I traded stories of tragedy and heroism that we had heard in some sort of morbid one-upmanship. My cousin was on a panel that got to ask questions to Washington D.C. officials and it was on television. My cousin was a celebrity! Everything about that day only made sense if I could fit it into my limited world view. The threat of war, the political maneuvering going on, were completely lost on me until years later.

Jon Palmer

My 4th grade social studies teacher made us take a quiz while he had the news on his big TV. Needless to say, with the towers falling up on the screen and confusion and panic taking over the classroom, none of us did very well on it. After that class, all the teachers tried to keep us calm by acting as if nothing was happening. I remember that as one of the worst school days ever, as nobody would explain anything that was happening (not that we would have really understood anything at that age).

Eric Levenson

This will weird out the older people, I’m sure, but I was in 5th grade on Sept. 11 at the tender age of 10. My school didn’t tell any students what was going on, so I was left happy as could be through the school day, and went through my regular schedule of classes. When I got home at about 4 p.m., my Southern-accented nanny asked if I’d heard what happened to the “Twin Taw-ers’’ – I hadn’t ever heard of them before – and told me they had fallen. Okay. I didn’t really grasp the importance of it.

I then walked into the other room and watched “Ed, Edd, and Eddy’’ on Cartoon Network until my parents came home. It wasn’t until we talked over dinner that I really understood that this was something worth paying attention to.