Lehigh community commemorates 25th anniversary of Sept. 11 attacks

The American flag rose above Lehigh University as the Clayton UC Lawn fell quiet Friday morning. Members of the Steel Battalion stood at attention while students, faculty and community members gathered around the lawn, lined with small American flags.

The annual gathering is a Lehigh tradition that brings the campus community together to honor the lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001. This year marked the 25th anniversary of the attacks.

From 8:30 to 9:30 a.m., cadets led the flag-raising with support from LUPD. Lehigh’s Student Senate distributed miniature flags for attendees to place on the lawn in honor of the 2,977 people who died.

This year marked the 12th year Student Senate has participated in the memorial.

Drew Smith, ‘27, president of Lehigh’s Student Senate, said attending the memorial has become a tradition for the organization’s executive board. He said the flags are owned by the Student Senate and placed around the flagpole each year to support the ceremony and the community.

“We know how much this day means to many individuals, and being able to be a part of that and support them is hugely important to us as an organization,” Smith said.

For those in attendance, the anniversary held different meanings. Some had memories of the attacks themselves, while others reflected on family members who served in the military or their own commitments to service.

Among those participating was Jorge Herrera, a Penn State Lehigh Valley student and member of the Color Guard. As he stood with the other cadets during the flag-raising, his mother, Alexandra Herrera, watched from the lawn.

Alexandra, an Easton resident, came to campus to see her son take part in the annual tradition. Jorge is in his second year of the Steel Battalion ROTC program, a path influenced in part by his father.

“It started with my father,” Jorge said. “He was in the military for 22 years, and that really inspired me to continue that mission, carry the torch.”

But for Jorge, the significance of the day reaches beyond his family’s military history. He is also a firefighter — the first in his generation of his family to serve in that role — connecting him to the first responders who made the ultimate sacrifice on Sept. 11.

“Knowing that I lost brothers and sisters on Sept. 11, that really does mean a lot more to me,” Jorge said.

From where Alexandra stood on the lawn, she watched her son carry out a tradition shaped by the same themes of service and sacrifice that have influenced his life.

“I’m here for my son,” Alexandra said. “Super proud of him.”

For Lieutenant Colonel Christopher Curran, Lehigh’s professor of military science who opened the ceremony, Sept. 11 is tied to a memory that began when he was an eighth grader.

Curran was an eighth grader sitting in Latin class when an announcement came over his school’s public address system that a plane had struck the North Tower. After the second plane hit, he said, students began to understand the magnitude of what was happening.

Classes stopped. A television was brought into the school’s main meeting area, where Curran  and much of his school watched the attacks unfold.

He said he had always been interested in the military and wanted to become a pilot. But watching the attacks unfold transformed that interest into a decision to serve.

“That moment crystallized it for me,” Curran said. 

Less than a month later, the U.S. military entered Afghanistan. Curran eventually served two tours there as an Army helicopter pilot, finding fulfillment in defending the country where the attacks originated.

Now in his second year at Lehigh, Curran sees the annual gathering as an opportunity for the university community — including the ROTC cadets who help carry out the tradition — to pause and reflect.

“It’s a great day to reflect and remember, and it’s a somber day,” Curran said.

While Curran remembers Sept. 11 from a classroom in eighth grade, Christa Neu experienced the attacks from the streets of Manhattan.

Neu, a multimedia content producer on Lehigh’s communications and public affairs team, was in Manhattan on Sept. 11 while working at TV Guide. 

She remembers making her way through the city that day and eventually walking across the Brooklyn Bridge as smoke filled the sky over Lower Manhattan.

In her pocket, Neu carried an Olympus Stylus Epic film camera, something she regularly had with her at the time. 

With Lower Manhattan covered in black smoke and sunlight breaking through on the Brooklyn side, Neu stopped to photograph, documenting what she was seeing as the city struggled to understand what had happened.

Years later, Neu said those photographs remain part of how she remembers the day — not simply as a historical event, but as a collection of moments she witnessed firsthand.

Neu said she did not talk about her experience for a long time because she did not feel the day was about her. But as younger generations who were not alive when the attacks occurred enter college, she said she has come to see value in sharing those firsthand experiences.

“I think it’s important for people…we are primary sources of that time, and so it’s not about me, but it’s about my observations of that story that can help make a connection,” Neu said.

She also said sharing those experiences can help students understand Sept. 11 as more than a historical event, but as an experience shaped by the people who lived through it.

The connection extends beyond remembering the past. For Smith, the memorial also serves as a reminder of the responsibility students have to carry what they learn at Lehigh into their communities.

“I believe the goal of being a Lehigh student and pursuing an education is to take the knowledge that we learn here out there into the real world,” Smith said.