ALTOONA, Pa. — When the Flight 93 National Memorial Oral History Project was launched in 2004, its purpose was to collect words from one of the darkest days in American history. To organize, understand and preserve them. To allow them to speak their truths on ordinary days but on the significant ones, as well.
One year, five, then 10 passed. This Sept. 11 marked 25 years, a quarter of century, since four commercial airliners were hijacked by al-Qaeda terrorists. Three were flown into American landmarks. The fourth, United Airlines Flight 93, crashed into a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, when passengers and crew fought back against the terrorists.
In 2013, Penn State Altoona entered a partnership with the National Park Service in which history majors and students in honors English help bring together a collection of living voices that tell the story of Flight 93 and its aftermath.
Nearly 900 firsthand accounts have been gathered from those who were involved with or impacted by the crash. It’s a comprehensive list that includes first-responders, journalists, residents of the Shanksville area, FBI investigators, Red Cross volunteers, government and airline officials, friends and family of the flight’s passengers and crew.
Students are among the volunteers who sift through those interviews, most of which are between 90 and 120 minutes, and pare them down to their most important bones to create abstracts, or summaries, that are used for research, education and archiving. Formally integrated into the Flight 93 National Memorial Museum's permanent historical collection, along with official reports, photographs, video and other documents relating to the day, students’ names appear on those abstracts — they are recorders of history.
“Participating in the Flight 93 Oral History Project was especially meaningful to me as a history major,” said Michele Bettwy, an adult at the time of the attacks, who worked on the project in 2013. “I've always loved studying the human side of history, regular people and their experiences, and oral histories are one of the best ways of preserving those stories.”
Bettwy said that it was awe-inspiring to know that the work she was doing would become part of a permanent historical record: “It wasn't just another project for a grade, but we were preserving history and helping future researchers."
Diana Forry was 12 years old when the attacks occurred and remembers vividly being in her seventh-grade science class. Forry said the attacks influenced her decision to join the military, and she served in the Air Force for six years. At the end of her active duty, Forry enrolled at Penn State Altoona, later participating in the oral history project through an independent study.
“I'm honored that I had the opportunity to be a part of the project,” Forry said. “However, I don't feel that my feelings really take the forefront of this; it's the significance of these stories that lead the way. And those stories have caused meaningful change for myself on the individual level.”
More than a decade later, the work continues in the same way, but the ages of the students, and by default perspectives, have changed since Bettwy and Forry participated.
According to the 9/11 Memorial and Museum, nearly 100 million Americans are too young to remember that September day, including this generation of traditional college students. Their knowledge and understanding of the attacks aren’t from a deeply rooted, lived, emotional experience.
The Flight 93 Oral History Project gives these students a rare opportunity to establish their own personal relationships and connections to the people directly and indirectly impacted by that day. The work transcends a passive routine of reading a school textbook, seeing a post on social media, or hearing a story from a family member. It gives them an engaging, tangible point of entry, to be inside of the stories.
Madelyn Peachman was born in 2003. The history major said working on the project helped expand her understanding of what happened that day.
“It’s sometimes difficult to relate to older generations who experienced 9/11," Peachman said. "Our perspective on this event has mostly been built off of the effects ingrained into our society. Being able to work on this project provided an immersive experience for me.”
Frames of reference may be different, but the impact on students and what they want to accomplish with their work is the same.
Peachman said she believes each person interviewed has an important story to tell.
“They should be acknowledged and honored," Peachman said. "Through my abstract, I hope that I was able to shed light on just one of the many people affected.”
Forry agreed.
“I hope that I was able to contribute to the preservation of these stories, their significance, and the way they encapsulate the feelings of that day,” she said. “At the Flight 93 Memorial, you can listen to recordings that individuals on the plane left for their loved ones; you can feel that fear, the unknown, the bravery and the love that every single one of those passengers carried. This oral project brings to light the same emotional complexity of others involved with the Flight 93 crash.”
Bettwy added that she did not take her sense of responsibility lightly.
“When constructing the first draft of my abstract, I had to reread the transcript several times because the initial reaction to the personal story was so emotional. I hope that our work is useful to future historians and researchers," Bettwy said. "I want them, as well as family and friends of the victims, to know we treated it with the respect and seriousness it deserves.”
It is that solemnity and dedication on the part of students that helps keep the project active — and what Forry said she hopes moves it forward.
“As history has proven, the world will change over and over again, but there is so much we can learn from these events so that we can do better and build an even brighter future,” she said. “The Flight 93 Oral History Project offers the opportunity to critically engage with this history, its preservation, and what change means moving forward.”
To date, Penn State Altoona students have contributed 130 abstracts to the project. Their work to maintain relationships and community around a pivotal point in American history helps builds a bridge between history and understanding, between memory and meaning, to help the stories of courage, sacrifice, love and loss to live on.