My first source is Jaime Salcedo. He is my father. He is the oldest person in my family and has a perspective of that day. He has a very great view of how the world works.
He was on the 405 Freeway, going to work listening to the radio when the first plane crashed into the tower. Shortly after that, he said the second plane crashed into the tower. He was in complete shock. He thought it was a bad joke and then the third plane hit the pentagon. He was mixed with emotions, angry, scared, and hopeless. He called home to speak with his wife to make sure she was okay. During this time, her English skills weren’t the strongest, and he was afraid that she wouldn’t understand what was happening. He said he was very confused about the attack. He prayed for the families of the victims/
The second source is Amanda Beers. One of my teachers in high school. She lives in Washington, and she was a teacher at this time.
She remembers 9/11 like it was yesterday. She didn’t know what was going on. She thought it was a total accident when the first plane hit the first building. Then when she said the second plane hit the second twin tower, that’s when she knew it was a terrorist attack on the United States. She said her heart dropped when the second plane hit. She was watching all this happening in the news. The first thing she did was call her husband to see if he was fine and if he knew what was going on. Luckily, after a couple of attempts of calling him, he eventually did answer, and he was safe. During this time, she was also a teacher at an elementary school. Classes were canceled for about a week. When they returned to classes, it was a quiet couple of days, a lot of reflecting on what happened. She said it was for the students that had family in New York. It was a long recovery process for everyone.
My third source is Sabina Salcedo. She is my sister. She is the youngest in my family. She is very bright in school and has a great view of things. She was born in 2004 three years after the event of happening, so it will be very interesting to hear what she has to say about it.
She was born three years after the events of 9/11. She started in the interview that it was a horrible event in the United States, and a lot of people lost their lives that day. She is now a Sophomore in High School. She told me how she found out about 9/11 was through the history channel, and she mentioned around the first or second grade. The teacher would teach the class about the events of 9/11 and show a movie/ documentary. She said the planes hitting the building were one that she remembers the most.
The importance of human and personal stories in the building of our collective memories is a big part of our society. It’s important to hear people’s stories about how we learned about the past and grow. All of this source had different experiences on this day. I feel like this exercise helped reflect on this day and reminded us how far we have grown as a community since the events of 9/11. Journalism has an increasingly significant role in our lives as information, data, and social media become more influential. As journalists are exploring this as a professional career and citizens see it as something that is personal work at some points.
Max Salcedo 