9/11, quarter-century later: West Seattle memory with a mystery

If you’re ~30+, you likely have a 9/11 story to tell. We received the following story from West Seattle banker Ryan Sales, including a mystery that someone who reads this might be able to solve:

On Remembering 9/11
After 25 Years

Morning Edition on NPR was my alarm clock for years starting in college at the University of Utah. Bob Edwards was most often the sound that pulled me from sleep.

I believe it was Seattle Mariners left fielder Charles Gipson who dove to catch the final out for the Mariners’ 104th win on Monday, September 10th, 2001. World Series fever had Seattle in an epidemic of Mojo fever.

I slept on that Mojo high.

Homer Simpson woke me up Tuesday morning around 6:05 pacific time. Homer was oddly talking about a “propjet” crashing into the North Tower, World Trade Center 1. As my brain’s cartoon Mojo haze gave way to weekday workday consciousness, I realized Homer was Bob Edwards, who was now talking about passenger jets and not prop-jets. His vocal tones were deepening into an uncharted baritone of serious.

The walk to work from my West Seattle, Admiral District apartment to the Junction felt like an episode from The Twilight Zone. No planes. No cars. No walkers or joggers.

This was pre-smartphones.

I arrived at work and began opening the West Seattle First Mutual branch where Pegasus Pizza is located today. My manager Dotty joined me next. Shock was our conversation. First Mutual had already sent out closure approval emails. But Dotty and I resisted the initial closure request. We put out coffee and dragged out a small lunchroom curved-screen TV.

We opened to no one. Quiet. Blue sky.

A couple people and a couple calls. After a half-hour our audience was five.

There was a tall, close to 6’2” gentleman who walked in slow and calm, eyes up, baseball cap down, who talked with Dotty for a few short minutes. It was a little over an hour after opening. About four people were still at the small TV with coffee. I was working hard to be busy with unsettled calm and shock augmenting my caffeine nerves. I had breathing and focus. He slowed as he approached the corner of my desk.

This is my first and only effort to recount with certain inaccuracy what he said to me that Tuesday. September 11th, 2001.

I’m proud you’re open today. I was the front line of our country on D-Day. When the ramps of our Higgins Boats opened at Omaha, I watched two good buddies shot up. I made it to beach, and we knew we were lucky. But we knew even more we were there for a responsibility. We had lots more work to do. Later they moved me to the Pacific. And I had to find beach under fire again. The responsibility for doing our job was our greater service. A service I believe we did well for our country.

Now it’s your generation. It’s you. Thankfully, and with blessing there’s no bullets at your desk. But I saw many closed doors in the Junction today but yours is open. You are the new front line. Customer Service. Now you serve with the greatest responsibility to serve our country. Thank you.

I thanked him back in a cloudy muffle of near tears.

If you lived in West Seattle in the late ’90s and early 2000s and frequented the Junction, you likely remember and know him. He was well known and well liked. He lived on Beach Drive. Who was he?

He is who I remember 9/11 for. No one who worked that Tuesday and served in response to it are forgotten. They are a remembered frontline that lives on in honor and kindness the way that World War II veteran lives with my memories. The responsibility and service he talked about with me is the responsibility and service we carry for all from 9/11.

I will be first at work today. I will open. I will remember with a full day of focus breathed with responsibility and service to the community of our country.

By Ryan J Sales
09/11/2026

KT September 11, 2026 (5:24 pm)

I was at the urgent care that was by the Junction the morning of 9/11. While I was waiting to be seen, dozens of people came in asking if they could donate blood to help NYC.

Ryan Sales September 12, 2026 (1:04 am)

KT thank you.

Sheila G September 11, 2026 (9:02 pm)

Ryan, I wish I could give you the name of this gentleman, but I don’t know who he is, or was. What I would like to say is “thank you” for this inspiring memory. And all good wishes for another memorable, meaningful day. The work continues. Sheila G, in France

Ryan Sales September 12, 2026 (1:02 am)

Sheila, you are welcome. And thank you for your kind words.

Lynn Y September 12, 2026 (1:15 am)

Anniversaries have a way of making time stand still. I lived on the other side of the world at the time. I remember turning on the TV, seeing scenes i thought was a movie only to realize it was not. We remember where we were, who we were with, and the days that followed. Two years later I was married to a Marine, a local West Seattlelite, who was sent to Iraq, in response to 9/11. Later, I befriended another Marine whose childhood friend died in one of the towers. And last year i hired an Afghan refugee who fled the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan. Never thought i would have this few degrees of separation from this terrible day. I also can’t help but wonder what my life, and the life of thousands of people would have been, if the events of this day never took place. It is impossible to forget.

22blades September 12, 2026 (2:03 am)

Shock & instant utter chaos in my airline industry. We lost coworkers that day. Counseling hotlines were established. Everything literally came to an instantaneous stop. The Seattle crew from Tokyo made an emergency landing in Yellowknife & spent a few days there. Another coworker called from the east coast to say they were ok. There was suddenly no schedule or work. After a few days, talk of bankruptcy (it eventually happened & we lost our pension). The industry spiraled for a few more years with layoffs & demotions & the workplace changed with the atmosphere of additional security procedures. Nothing compared to the loved ones including of the crews lost.

Cristina September 12, 2026 (9:20 am)

I was in NY at college when all classes were cancelled. Then went home with a friend where we stopped to watch the tower burn from the side of a road. One had already fallen. My husband was in the city watching the towers burn and then walking with hundreds of other people back to Brooklyn. I have many connections to that day. I was born and raised in Long Beach, NY. Right outside of the city. Lost many people from my town that day and in the ensuing years due to 09/11 illnesses. Names from 09/11 victims from Long Beach, NY as follows:

Bettina Browne. Firefighter Michael Scott Carlo. Firefighter John Elgis. Firefighter Thomas Farrell. Stephen Hoffman. Captain Terence Hatton. Firefighter Billy Hughes. Joe Kellen. Firefighter Michael Kiefer. Neil Levin. Charles P. Lucania. Noell Maerz. Firefighter Kenneth Joseph Marino. Captain John McCarthy. Chief Brian O’Flaherty. Firefighter Michael Ornauer. Firefighter William Quick. Firefighter Gregory Stajk. Detective Richard Wentz…..One of these days the name of my best friend’s uncle will be added to this list as he has been battling 09/11 cancers over the last 20 years.

I miss my hometown. I miss what Islamic terrorism took from us all. It is imperative that we remember and never downplay it or reframe it. May the memory of each of those souls who were murdered that day and taken in the years after due to illnesses be a Blessing forever.