Napa Valley’s World Trade Center memorials honor heroes and victims of 9/11
By John Dunbar
Editor's Note: We are publishing this feature two days ahead of the actual 9/11 commemoration to give our readers ample time to plan their attendance at any of the various ceremonies taking place throughout the Napa Valley.
NAPA VALLEY, Calif. — On Sept. 11, 2001, thousands of lives were lost in coordinated terrorist attacks in New York, at the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and in a Pennsylvania field. It was one of those life-changing times in history when every person can recall how, when and where they learned about it. Here in Napa Valley, despite being approximately 3,000 miles from the focus of that day’s events, we felt the impacts powerfully and personally.
On that day in 2001 community leaders were in New York on business. Residents were in Manhattan for work or pleasure. Some were close enough to witness the horror firsthand. Others felt the paralysis and fear that consumed the nation. Here and across the world we watched in disbelief as the twin towers of the World Trade Center collapsed.
This year three 9/11 memorial services will be held in the Napa Valley on the anniversary of that horrific morning. American Canyon hosts a Patriot’s Day Remembrance Ceremony starting at 11 a.m. at the city's Police and Fire, 911 Donaldson Way East. The City of Napa ceremony also begins at 11 a.m. at the 9/11 Memorial Garden, 1075 Main St. Yountville's starts at 7 a.m. at the Yountville Community Center, 6516 Washington St.
The start of Yountville’s memorial
In 2009 local resident and vintner Sean Larkin told me about a program organized by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and the 9/11 Families Association to find permanent homes for the pieces of building steel, vehicles and other objects recovered from the World Trade Center site. Items were being distributed to museums, town governments, schools, non-profit organizations and community groups that included fire, law enforcement and emergency response departments. The recipients were required to commit that the artifacts they received would be used in a public display.
We decided to request an artifact from the north tower, home to the Windows on the World rooftop restaurant, noting the unique impact that tragedy had on the culinary world. Many of the restaurant’s workers had local connections, having honed their craft alongside Napa Valley chefs and industry staff.
Larkin traveled to the hangar at John F. Kennedy International Airport where all the artifacts were stored.
“Pretty somber,” he said of the atmosphere in and around the facility. “Everybody was waiting in line to get their pieces. Some fire department crews all dressed up formal, some National Guard. Nobody was allowed to take any pictures in there. It was an honor to do it.”
On the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks in 2011 we unveiled Yountville’s 300-pound memorial artifact at the Yountville Community Center Plaza, where hundreds of first responders and community members gathered for a solemn ceremony. Every year since I have led a remembrance in front of the memorial, including a minute of silent reflection at 7:28 a.m., the West Coast time the north tower fell.
In 2014 we invited former New Jersey Gov. Donald DiFrancesco (2001-02) and Commissioner Anthony Sartor of the New York New Jersey Port Authority – both of whom helped us acquire the artifact – to join us so that we could express our thanks and show them the memorial we created together.
Napa’s 30-ton 9/11 Memorial
During the same period local artist Gordon Huether led a special task force consisting of City of Napa officials and private citizens to identify city property for a downtown display. Huether designed Napa’s memorial to fit the Main Street site where it stands today.
“The creation of the 9/11 Memorial here in Napa was an intense and complicated process,” Huether said. “We were able to secure six massive pieces of steel from both the north and south towers with a combined weight of 30 tons.”
Huether’s in-person experience was similar to the one Larkin described when he visited the 80,000-square-foot Hangar 17 and witnessed the awe-inspiring scene.
“I traveled to New York to see the steel that was set aside for us,” Huether said. “All the remnants of the destroyed towers were stored in an old hangar. There I saw a half-burned American flag, destroyed firetrucks and mangled steel. It was very moving and emotional. Seeing all the wreckage in one place was heart-wrenching.”
Both Larkin and Huether knew and worked with Fred Biagi of Biagi Bros. trucking company in Napa, who provided two big rigs to haul all the artifacts across the country to their permanent Napa Valley destinations. Huether then arranged the steel columns vertically with glass panels listing the names of the nearly 3,000 people who died in the attacks to convey visually the magnitude of the tragic event and its aftermath.
“Creating the 9/11 Memorial was and continues to be one of my proudest moments,” Huether said.
Napa City Councilmember Bernie Narvaez, a U.S Marine veteran, has taken the lead organizing Napa's annual 9/11 remembrance services.
“We have a duty and responsibility to echo the stories of the victims and heroes of 9/11,” he said. “It forever changed our country and the lives of so many Americans. I hope that we continue to take a moment to remember and pass on those stories to future generations.”
American Canyon’s Memorial emerges
In 2016 Huether worked with American Canyon fire officials to build a World Trade Center steel-and-glass memorial located in front of that city’s Police and Fire Department Administration Building.
According to his website, in 2009, when the City of Napa obtained its allocation of steel from the World Trade Center to build the Napa 9/11 Memorial project, the fire chief of the City of American Canyon was inspired. The fundraising efforts of the American Canyon firefighters, the American Canyon Arts Foundation and others led to the final design of the third Napa County 9/11 Memorial 2014. Fundraising continued through Sept. 11, 2015.
The city dedicated its 9/11 memorial on Sept. 11, 2016 – 15 years to the day after Sept. 11, 2001.
Huether’s memorial design features two concrete supports that elevate the steel collar from one of the tower’s I-beams and two tall, illuminated glass panels that reference the twin towers of the World Trade Center.
“The World Trade Center remnant used for the American Canyon 9/11 Memorial was a part of one of the four massive beams used in the Napa Memorial,” Huether said. “We offered this remnant to the City of American Canyon, and we were honored to design and install this important memorial.”
Napa Valley’s memorials stand in remembrance of the lives lost and those changed forever on that fateful day in United States history.
John Dunbar is former mayor of Yountville, and he served on the Yountville Town Council for 18 years.
Thank you for all of this information. Knowing more about the 9/11 Memorials in the Napa Valley made me proud to have called it home for a number of years. I really enjoyed reading about how they came to be, and to know when and were memorial events are happening tomorrow.