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The second week in September is a saddening memory for many people around the world. This September 11th marks the 22nd anniversary of the attacks on the Twin Towers. These are the stories of teachers and staff who recount the events as they remember.
by Brylee Sanders and Brayden Downey
The second week in September is a saddening memory for many people around the world. This September 11th marks the 22nd anniversary of the attacks on the Twin Towers. These are the stories of teachers and staff who recount the events as they remember.
The morning of September 11th, 2001 started like any other regular morning for many. People were getting ready to head to work; others were getting their morning coffee brewed before taking the kids to school or reviewing their notes for an important meeting they had that day. Yet as the day started, it suddenly took a sharp and dark turn for the worst. Cody Tait, a teacher and Baseball coach here at WGHS was a young boy still in elementary school at the time of the attacks. Tait recalls, “-I was seven years old or so, I think I was in first grade and I was actually at Bay Creek Elementary School… I just moved from Michigan. We were just freshly in Walton County- Our teacher turned on the TV, just like we'd start our day any other day, there was a building on fire and we're all like, woah.” Nicole Kennedy is an absolutely marvelous math teacher here at Walnut Grove. Kennedy stated, “I was supposed to report for my first day of student teaching observation. So I and all of the teachers that were going with me to go do their observing and then do their student teaching. Another teacher and I met at her house and were going to meet the other teachers at the school. So she and I were gonna ride together, and I was literally sitting in her living room when it was all going down. So we all started texting each other and we're like: do we go to school? Do they even know what's happening?” Scott Antwine, a new teacher at WGHS was in his late 20’s during the time of the attack. Antwine explained, “I was in my car, driving to work… I was listening to Sports Talk Radio and then breaking news… so I went to work and told the secretaries in the office and the other staff to turn on the television. And we watched the first building because we didn’t know it was terrorism, and then the second plane hit as we were watching and we knew instantly that it was tragic...” At the time Antwine was a youth pastor and recalls his community being greatly affected by the event, “...there was a lot of anger... and what do we as a nation need to do to prevent this from happening again? Immediately a lot of people were looking for prayer, guidance, and safety for their families. And we just kinda looked for a place to grieve together as a nation. A lot of people from the community around us who weren't even a part of the church came and prayed together; we had hundreds.” Mitch Alligood, a history teacher at WGHS, at the time, was 29 and watching the attack unfold on a 13-inch TV at Old Monroe High School along with fellow staff members. Alligood’s friend sadly lost an acquaintance during the event who was a chef at a restaurant in one of the towers. The community at Old Monroe High School was greatly impacted by the event and took action, “I won’t ever forget it, the kids at the school, we stood in the halls with buckets for a week because the Sheriff was going to go up to N.Y. And we collected $700 in change, and he took it and gave it to one of the fire departments who needed it.” This was the first attack of such large scale to impact not only The United States but the world at large. Following the attacks all air traffic was immediately redirected and grounded. It would change the course of history for the world and change the way things were done forever. The Blog Tags Widget will appear here on the published site.
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9/15/2023