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September 11 Attacks
On
September 11, 2001, 19 militants associated with the Islamic extremist
group al Qaeda hijacked four airplanes and carried out suicide attacks
against targets in the United States. Two of the planes were flown into
the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, a third
plane hit the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington,
D.C., and the fourth plane crashed in a field in Shanksville,
Pennsylvania. Almost 3,000 people were killed during the 9/11 terrorist
attacks, which triggered major U.S. initiatives to combat terrorism and
defined the presidency of George W. Bush.
World Trade Center
On
September 11, 2001, at 8:45 a.m. on a clear Tuesday morning, an
American Airlines Boeing 767 loaded with 20,000 gallons of jet fuel
crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center in New York City.
The
impact left a gaping, burning hole near the 80th floor of the 110-story
skyscraper, instantly killing hundreds of people and trapping hundreds
more in higher floors.
As the evacuation of the tower and its
twin got underway, television cameras broadcasted live images of what
initially appeared to be a freak accident. Then, 18 minutes after the
first plane hit, a second Boeing 767—United Airlines Flight 175—appeared
out of the sky, turned sharply toward the World Trade Center and sliced
into the south tower near the 60th floor.
The collision caused a
massive explosion that showered burning debris over surrounding
buildings and onto the streets below. It immediately became clear that
America was under attack.
READ MORE: How 9/11 Became the Deadliest Day in History for U.S. Firefighters
Osama bin Laden
The
hijackers were Islamic terrorists from Saudi Arabia and several other
Arab nations. Reportedly financed by the al Qaeda terrorist organization
of Saudi fugitive Osama bin Laden, they were allegedly acting in
retaliation for America’s support of Israel, its involvement in the
Persian Gulf War and its continued military presence in the Middle East.
Some
of the terrorists had lived in the United States for more than a year
and had taken flying lessons at American commercial flight schools.
Others had slipped into the country in the months before September 11
and acted as the “muscle” in the operation.
The 19 terrorists
easily smuggled box-cutters and knives through security at three East
Coast airports and boarded four early-morning flights bound for
California, chosen because the planes were loaded with fuel for the long
transcontinental journey. Soon after takeoff, the terrorists
commandeered the four planes and took the controls, transforming
ordinary passenger jets into guided missiles.
WATCH: Road to 9/11 on HISTORY Vault
Pentagon Attack
As
millions watched the events unfolding in New York, American Airlines
Flight 77 circled over downtown Washington, D.C., before crashing into
the west side of the Pentagon military headquarters at 9:45 a.m.
Jet
fuel from the Boeing 757 caused a devastating inferno that led to the
structural collapse of a portion of the giant concrete building, which
is the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Defense.
All told, 125 military personnel and civilians were killed in the Pentagon, along with all 64 people aboard the airliner.
READ MORE: How the Pentagon's Design Saved Lives on September 11
Twin Towers Collapse
Less
than 15 minutes after the terrorists struck the nerve center of the
U.S. military, the horror in New York took a catastrophic turn when the
south tower of the World Trade Center collapsed in a massive cloud of
dust and smoke.
The structural steel of the skyscraper, built to
withstand winds in excess of 200 miles per hour and a large conventional
fire, could not withstand the tremendous heat generated by the burning
jet fuel.
At 10:30 a.m., the north building of the twin towers
collapsed. Only six people in the World Trade Center towers at the time
of their collapse survived. Almost 10,000 others were treated for
injuries, many severe.
SEE MORE: 9/11 Photos
Flight 93
Meanwhile,
a fourth California-bound plane—United Flight 93—was hijacked about 40
minutes after leaving Newark Liberty International Airport in New
Jersey. Because the plane had been delayed in taking off, passengers on
board learned of events in New York and Washington via cell phone and
Airfone calls to the ground.
Knowing that the aircraft was not
returning to an airport as the hijackers claimed, a group of passengers
and flight attendants planned an insurrection.
One of the
passengers, Thomas Burnett, Jr., told his wife over the phone that “I
know we’re all going to die. There’s three of us who are going to do
something about it. I love you, honey.” Another passenger—Todd
Beamer—was heard saying “Are you guys ready? Let’s roll” over an open
line.
Sandy Bradshaw, a flight attendant, called her husband and
explained that she had slipped into a galley and was filling pitchers
with boiling water. Her last words to him were “Everyone’s running to
first class. I’ve got to go. Bye.”
The passengers fought the four
hijackers and are suspected to have attacked the cockpit with a fire
extinguisher. The plane then flipped over and sped toward the ground at
upwards of 500 miles per hour, crashing in a rural field near
Shanksville in western Pennsylvania at 10:10 a.m.
All 44 people
aboard were killed. Its intended target is not known, but theories
include the White House, the U.S. Capitol, the Camp David presidential
retreat in Maryland or one of several nuclear power plants along the
eastern seaboard.
Scroll to Continue
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How Many People Died in the 9/11 Attacks?
A
total of 2,996 people were killed in the 9/11 attacks, including the 19
terrorist hijackers aboard the four airplanes. Citizens of 78 countries
died in New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania.
At the
World Trade Center, 2,763 died after the two planes slammed into the
twin towers. That figure includes 343 firefighters and paramedics, 23
New York City police officers and 37 Port Authority police officers who
were struggling to complete an evacuation of the buildings and save the
office workers trapped on higher floors.
At the Pentagon, 189
people were killed, including 64 on American Airlines Flight 77, the
airliner that struck the building. On Flight 93, 44 people died when the
plane crash-landed in Pennsylvania.
America Responds to the Attacks
At
7 p.m., President George W. Bush, who was in Florida at the time of the
attacks and had spent the day being shuttled around the country because
of security concerns, returned to the White House.
At 9 p.m., he
delivered a televised address from the Oval Office, declaring,
“Terrorist attacks can shake the foundations of our biggest buildings,
but they cannot touch the foundation of America. These acts shatter
steel, but they cannot dent the steel of American resolve.”
In a
reference to the eventual U.S. military response he declared, “We will
make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and
those who harbor them.”
Operation Enduring Freedom, the
American-led international effort to oust the Taliban regime in
Afghanistan and destroy Osama bin Laden’s terrorist network based there,
began on October 7. Within two months, U.S. forces had effectively
removed the Taliban from operational power, but the war continued, as
U.S. and coalition forces attempted to defeat a Taliban insurgency
campaign based in neighboring Pakistan.
Osama bin Laden, the
mastermind behind the September 11th attacks, remained at large until
May 2, 2011, when he was finally tracked down and killed by U.S. forces
at a hideout in Abbottabad, Pakistan. In June 2011, then-President
Barack Obama announced the beginning of large-scale troop withdrawals
from Afghanistan; it took until August 2021 for all U.S. forces to
withdraw.
Department of Homeland Security Is Created
In the
wake of security fears raised by 9/11 and the mailing of letters
containing anthrax that killed two and infected 17, The Homeland
Security Act of 2002 created the Department of Homeland Security. It was
signed into law by President George W. Bush on November 25, 2002.
Today, the Department of Homeland Security is a cabinet responsible for
preventing terror attacks, border security, immigrations and customs and
disaster relief and prevention.
The act was followed two days
later by the formation of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks
Upon the United States. The bipartisan “9/11 Commission,” as it came to
be known, was charged with investigating the events that lead up to
September 11th. The 9/11 Commission Report was released on July 22,
2004. It named Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind behind
9/11, “the principal architect of the 9/11 attacks.”
Mohammed
led propaganda operations for al Qaeda from 1999-2001. He was captured
on March 1, 2003 by the Central Intelligence Agency and Pakistan’s
Inter-Services Intelligence and interrogated before being imprisoned in
Guantanamo Bay detention camp with four other accused terrorists charged
with 9/11-related war crimes. The use of torture, including
waterboarding, during Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s interrogation has
received international attention. In August 2019, a U.S. military court
judge in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba set a trial date for Mohammed and the
other four men charged with plotting the 9/11 terrorist attacks to begin
in 2021; it was later postponed because of the c-19 pandemic.
Economic Impact of 9/11
The
9/11 attacks had an immediate negative effect on the U.S. economy. Many
Wall Street institutions, including the New York Stock Exchange, were
evacuated during the attacks. On the first day of trading after the
attacks, the market fell 7.1 percent, or 684 points. New York City’s
economy alone lost 143,000 jobs a month and $2.8 billion wages in the
first three months. The heaviest losses were in finance and air
transportation, which accounted for 60 percent of lost jobs. The
estimated cost of the World Trade Center damage is $60 billion. The cost
to clean the debris at Ground Zero was $750 million.
READ MORE: 5 Ways 9/11 Changed America
9/11 Victim Compensation Fund
Thousands
of first responders and people working and living in lower Manhattan
near Ground Zero were exposed to toxic fumes and particles emanating
from the towers as they burned and fell. By 2018, 10,000 people were
diagnosed with 9/11-related cancer.
From 2001 to 2004, over $7
billion dollars in compensation was given to families of the 9/11
victims and the 2,680 people injured in the attacks. Funding was renewed
on January 2, 2011, when President Barack Obama signed The James
Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act into law. Named for James
Zadroga, a New York City Police officer who died of respiratory disease
he contracted after rescuing people from the rubble at Ground Zero, the
law continued health monitoring and compensation for 9/11 first
responders and survivors.
In 2015, funding for the treatment of
9/11-related illness was renewed for five more years at a total of $7.4
billion. The Victim Compensation Fund was set to stop accepting claims
in December 2020.
On July 29, 2019, then-President Trump signed a
law authorizing support for the September 11 Victim Compensation Fund
through 2092. Previously, administrators had cut benefits by up to 70
percent as the $7.4 billion fund depleted. Vocal lobbyists for the fund
included Jon Stewart, 9/11 first responder John Feal and retired New
York Police Department detective and 9/11 responder Luis Alvarez, who
died of cancer 18 days after testifying before Congress.
9/11 Anniversary and Memorial
On
December 18, 2001, Congress approved naming September 11 “Patriot Day”
to commemorate the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. In 2009, Congress
named September 11 a National Day of Service and Remembrance.
The
first memorials to September 11 came in the immediate wake of the
attacks, with candlelight vigils and flower tributes at U.S. embassies
around the world. In Great Britain, Queen Elizabeth sang the American
national anthem during the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace.
Rio de Janeiro put up billboards showing the city’s Christ the Redeemer
statue embracing the New York City skyline.
For the first
anniversary of the attacks in New York City in 2002, two bright columns
of light were shot up into the sky from where the Twin Towers once
stood. The “Tribute in Light” then became an annual installation run by
the Municipal Art Society of New York. On clear nights, the beams are
visible from over 60 miles away.
A World Trade Center Site
Memorial Competition was held to select an appropriate permanent
memorial to the victims of 9/11. The winning design by Michael Arad,
“Reflecting Absence,” now sits outside the museum in an eight-acre park.
It consists of two reflecting pools with waterfalls rushing down where
the Twin Towers once rose into the sky.
The names of all 2,983
victims are engraved on the 152 bronze panels surrounding the pools,
arranged by where individuals were on the day of the attacks, so
coworkers and people on the same flight are memorialized together. The
site was opened to the public on September 11, 2011, to commemorate the
10-year anniversary of 9/11. The National September 11 Memorial &
Museum followed, opening on the original World Trade Center site in May
2014. The Freedom Tower, also on the original World Trade Center site,
opened in November 2014.
Photo Galleries
9/11: World Trade Center
Aerial View Of Manhattan Shows Smouldering World Trade City
15
Gallery
15 Images
9/11: FDNY
September-9-11-Getty-1161266
10
Gallery
10 Images
9/11: The Pentagon
September-9-11-Pentagon-GettyImages-661706738
12
Gallery
12 Images
9/11: Flight 93
Flight-93-119746803
7
Gallery
7 Images
The President on 9/11
GettyImages-119747288
10
Gallery
10 Images
9/11 Lost and Found: The Items Left Behind
1-shoes
10
Gallery
10 Images
Sources
"Study Confirms 9/11 Impact on New York City Economy." The New York Times
"September 11: nearly 10,000 people affected by 'cesspool of cancer.'" The Guardian.
"Congress passes 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund extension championed by Jon Stewart." CNN.com
The Encyclopedia of 9/11. New York Magazine.
FAQ About 9/11. 9/11 Memorial.
September 11th Terror Attacks Fast Facts. CNN.
9/11 Death Statistics. StatisticBrain.com.
HISTORY Vault
Citation Information
Article Title
September 11 Attacks
Author
History.com Editors
Website Name
HISTORY
URL
https://www.history.com/topics/21st-century/9-11-attacks
Access Date
22 July 2022
Publisher
A&E Television Networks
Last Updated
September 22, 2021
Original Published Date
February 17, 2010
By
History.com Editors
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VIDEOS
President George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld and others look back on the attack on the Pentagon on September 11, 2001.
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Americana (culture)
Apple pie, baseball and the United States flag are three well-known American cultural icons.
Liberty Enlightening the World: the famous New York landmark illustrated in a print by Currier and Ives
This article is part of a series on the
Culture of the
United States
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Symbols
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Americana
artifacts are related to the history, geography, folklore, and cultural
heritage of the United States of America. Americana is any collection
of materials and things concerning or characteristic of the United
States or of the American people, and is representative or even
stereotypical of American culture as a whole.[1][2]
What is and
is not considered Americana is heavily influenced by national identity,
historical context, patriotism and nostalgia. The ethos or guiding
beliefs or ideals which have come to characterize America, such as The
American Dream, are central to the idea. Americana encompasses not only
material objects but also people, places, concepts and historical eras
which are popularly identified with American culture.
The name
Americana also refers to Americana music, a genre of contemporary music
that incorporates elements of various American music styles, including
country, roots rock, folk, bluegrass, and blues, resulting in a
distinctive roots-oriented sound.[3][4]
As nostalgia
From
the mid to late 20th century, Americana was largely conceptualized as a
nostalgia for an idealized life in small towns and cities in the United
States around the turn of the century, roughly in the period between
1880 and the First World War, popularly considered "The Good Old
Days".[5] It was believed that much of the structure of 20th-century
American life and culture had been cemented in that time and place.
American author Henry Seidel Canby wrote:
It is the small
town, the small city, that is our heritage. We have made
twentieth-century America from it, and some account of these communities
as they were ... we owe our children and grandchildren.[6]
American historian Hampton Sides wrote in Americana: Dispatches from the New Frontier:
The United States of America is such a glorious mess of contradiction,
such a crazy quilt of competing themes, such a fecund mishmash of people
and ideas, that defining us is pretty much pointless. There is, of
course, a kind of faded notion of "Americana", one that concerns Route
66, diners, freak rock formations, and the like—but even in its halcyon
days this "roadside attraction" version of America was never an accurate
or nuanced distillation of our massively complicated culture.
There are scenes and places, wattages and personages, that
belong—inextricably, unmistakably—to this country alone. There is an
American quality, a tone, an energy ... instantly recognizable
..."[7][page needed]
Many kinds of cultural artifacts fall within
the definition of Americana: the things involved need not be old, but
are usually associated with some quintessential element of the American
experience. Each period of United States history is reflected by the
advertising and marketing of the time, and the various types of
antiques, collectibles, memorabilia and vintage items from these time
periods are typical of what is popularly considered Americana. The
Atlantic described the term as "slang for the comforting, middle-class
ephemera at your average antique store—things like needle-pointed
pillows, Civil War daguerreotypes, and engraved silverware sets".[8]
The
nostalgia for this period was based on a remembrance of confidence in
American life that had emerged during the period due to such factors as a
sense that the frontier had finally been "conquered", with the U.S.
Census Bureau's declaration that it was "closed" in 1890, as well as the
recent victory in the Spanish–American War.[5] By 1912, the contiguous
United States was at last fully politically incorporated, and the idea
of the nation as a single, solid unity could begin to take hold.
As Canby put it,
Americans at this time "really believed all they heard on the Fourth of
July or read in school readers. They set on one plane of time, and that
the present, the Declaration of Independence, the manifest destiny of
America, the new plumbing, the growth of the factory system, the morning
paper, and the church sociable. It was all there at once, better than
elsewhere, their own, and permanent. ... They had just the country they
wanted...and they believed it would be the same, except for more
bathtubs and faster trains, forever ... for the last time in living
memory everyone knew exactly what it meant to be an American."[6]
On growing up Italian-American, novelist Don DeLillo stated:
It’s no accident that my first novel was called Americana. This was a
private declaration of independence, a statement of my intention to use
the whole picture, the whole culture. America was and is the immigrant's
dream, and as the son of two immigrants I was attracted by the sense of
possibility that had drawn my grandparents and parents.
— Conversations With Don DeLillo[9]
The
zeitgeist of this idealized period is captured in the Disneyland theme
park's Main Street, U.S.A. section (which was inspired by both Walt
Disney's hometown of Marceline, Missouri and Harper Goff's childhood
home of Fort Collins, Colorado),[10] as well as the musical and movie
The Music Man and Thornton Wilder's stage play Our Town.[5] Especially
revered in nostalgic Americana are small-town institutions like the
barber shop,[11] drug store, soda fountain and ice cream parlor;[12]
some of these were eventually resurrected by mid-twentieth century
nostalgia for the time period in businesses like the Farrell's Ice Cream
Parlour chain, with its 1890s theme.[13]
Examples
Cultural symbols
The Statue of Liberty
The U.S. flag, and Old Glory in particular
"The Star-Spangled Banner"
The Fourth of July
Apple pie
Cowboy
Baseball
Cheerleading
White picket fence[14]
Religious camp meeting[15]
Tent revival[15]
Brand names
Coca-Cola[16][17]
Levi's blue jeans, especially Levi's 501s[17][18]
Budweiser
Jim Beam
Jack Daniel's
Marlboro
Harley-Davidson
Ford
Chevrolet
Nike
See also
History of immigration to the United States
Culture of the United States
Folklore of the United States
History of the United States
American studies
Transcendentalism
Romanticism
Black Americana
Similar concepts
Australiana, for cultural artifacts from Australia
Canadiana, for cultural artifacts from Canada
Communist nostalgia, a similar concept in former or currently communist countries
Floridiana, artifacts relating to the state of Florida.
Hawaiiana, Native Hawaiian cultural artifacts from the U.S. state of Hawaii.
Kiwiana, for cultural artifacts from New Zealand (Kiwi being a nickname for New Zealanders).
Ostalgie, a similar concept in East Germany
PRL nostalgia, a similar concept in Poland
Rhodesiana, a similar concept in Zimbabwe relating to items made in its colonial (Rhodesia) era
Soviet nostalgia, a similar concept in the former Soviet Union
Yugo-nostalgia, a similar concept in the former Yugoslav states
References
"Americana". Merriam-Webster Dictionary.
"Americana". Dictionary.com Unabridged (Online). n.d.
Shriver, Jerry (31 August 2009). "Grammys will be putting Americana on the map". USA Today.
"2011 Grammy Category Descriptions" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 3 January 2015. Retrieved 18 December 2012.
Sears, Stephen (1975). Hometown U.S.A. New York: American Heritage. pp. 6–9. ISBN 0-671-22079-9.
Canby, Henry Seidel (1934). The Age of Confidence: Life in the Nineties. New York: Farrar & Rinehart. ASIN B000857UVO.
Sides, Hampton (2007). Americana: Dispatches from the New Frontier. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1400033553.
Giovanni Russonello (August 2013). "Why Is a Music Genre Called 'Americana' So Overwhelmingly White and Male?". The Atlantic.
DeLillo, Don (January 13, 2005). Conversations with Don DeLillo. University Press of Mississippi. p. 88. ISBN 1578067049.
"Local
History Archive Larimer Legends – Old Town & Disneyland – City of
Fort Collins, Colorado". Library.ci.fort-collins.co.us. Archived from
the original on 2009-01-25. Retrieved 2013-12-19.
Sears, Stephen (1975). Hometown U.S.A. New York: American Heritage. pp. 12–13, 29. ISBN 0-671-22079-9.
Sears, Stephen (1975). Hometown U.S.A. New York: American Heritage. pp. 12–13, 20. ISBN 0-671-22079-9.
"Farrell's
looks to restart growth Owner outlines expansion plans for iconic ice
cream chain". Nation's Restaurant News. August 31, 2010. Retrieved 4
June 2014.
Xiong, Nzong (2008-03-03). "White picket fences appease
homeowners". TuscaloosaNews.com. McClatchy-Tribune News Service.
Archived from the original on 2015-09-02. "Americana aside, people like
white picket fences for a couple of practical reasons."
Stoutland, Frederick A. (2006). Landscapes of Christianity. FAS Publishing. p. 361. ISBN 9780977234103.
Correspondent,
DON MELVIN, Atlanta. "COCA-COLA A SIP OF AMERICANA THINGS HAVE BEEN
GOING BETTER WITH COKE SINCE 1886". Sun-Sentinel.com.
Day, Sherri;
Elliott, Stuart (10 January 2003). "THE MEDIA BUSINESS: ADVERTISING;
Coca-Cola goes back to its 'Real' past in an effort to find some new
fizz for its Classic brand. - The New York Times". The New York Times.
"The Americana Essentials That Will Literally Never Go Out of Style | Complex". Complex Networks.
External links
Look up Americana or americana in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Americana.
Merriam-Webster definition of "Americana"
vte
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On September 11, 2001, 19 militants associated with the Islamic extremist group al Qaeda hijacked four airplanes and carried out suicide attacks against targets in the United States. Two of the planes were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, a third plane hit the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C., and the fourth plane crashed in a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Almost 3,000 people were killed during the 9/11 terrorist attacks, which triggered major U.S. initiatives to combat terrorism and defined the presidency of George W. Bush.
World Trade Center
On September 11, 2001, at 8:45 a.m. on a clear Tuesday morning, an American Airlines Boeing 767 loaded with 20,000 gallons of jet fuel crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center in New York City.
The impact left a gaping, burning hole near the 80th floor of the 110-story skyscraper, instantly killing hundreds of people and trapping hundreds more in higher floors.
As the evacuation of the tower and its twin got underway, television cameras broadcasted live images of what initially appeared to be a freak accident. Then, 18 minutes after the first plane hit, a second Boeing 767—United Airlines Flight 175—appeared out of the sky, turned sharply toward the World Trade Center and sliced into the south tower near the 60th floor.
The collision caused a massive explosion that showered burning debris over surrounding buildings and onto the streets below. It immediately became clear that America was under attack.
READ MORE: How 9/11 Became the Deadliest Day in History for U.S. Firefighters
Osama bin Laden
The hijackers were Islamic terrorists from Saudi Arabia and several other Arab nations. Reportedly financed by the al Qaeda terrorist organization of Saudi fugitive Osama bin Laden, they were allegedly acting in retaliation for America’s support of Israel, its involvement in the Persian Gulf War and its continued military presence in the Middle East.
Some of the terrorists had lived in the United States for more than a year and had taken flying lessons at American commercial flight schools. Others had slipped into the country in the months before September 11 and acted as the “muscle” in the operation.
The 19 terrorists easily smuggled box-cutters and knives through security at three East Coast airports and boarded four early-morning flights bound for California, chosen because the planes were loaded with fuel for the long transcontinental journey. Soon after takeoff, the terrorists commandeered the four planes and took the controls, transforming ordinary passenger jets into guided missiles.
WATCH: Road to 9/11 on HISTORY Vault
Pentagon Attack
As millions watched the events unfolding in New York, American Airlines Flight 77 circled over downtown Washington, D.C., before crashing into the west side of the Pentagon military headquarters at 9:45 a.m.
Jet fuel from the Boeing 757 caused a devastating inferno that led to the structural collapse of a portion of the giant concrete building, which is the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Defense.
All told, 125 military personnel and civilians were killed in the Pentagon, along with all 64 people aboard the airliner.
READ MORE: How the Pentagon's Design Saved Lives on September 11
Twin Towers Collapse
Less than 15 minutes after the terrorists struck the nerve center of the U.S. military, the horror in New York took a catastrophic turn when the south tower of the World Trade Center collapsed in a massive cloud of dust and smoke.
The structural steel of the skyscraper, built to withstand winds in excess of 200 miles per hour and a large conventional fire, could not withstand the tremendous heat generated by the burning jet fuel.
At 10:30 a.m., the north building of the twin towers collapsed. Only six people in the World Trade Center towers at the time of their collapse survived. Almost 10,000 others were treated for injuries, many severe.
SEE MORE: 9/11 Photos
Flight 93
Meanwhile, a fourth California-bound plane—United Flight 93—was hijacked about 40 minutes after leaving Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey. Because the plane had been delayed in taking off, passengers on board learned of events in New York and Washington via cell phone and Airfone calls to the ground.
Knowing that the aircraft was not returning to an airport as the hijackers claimed, a group of passengers and flight attendants planned an insurrection.
One of the passengers, Thomas Burnett, Jr., told his wife over the phone that “I know we’re all going to die. There’s three of us who are going to do something about it. I love you, honey.” Another passenger—Todd Beamer—was heard saying “Are you guys ready? Let’s roll” over an open line.
Sandy Bradshaw, a flight attendant, called her husband and explained that she had slipped into a galley and was filling pitchers with boiling water. Her last words to him were “Everyone’s running to first class. I’ve got to go. Bye.”
The passengers fought the four hijackers and are suspected to have attacked the cockpit with a fire extinguisher. The plane then flipped over and sped toward the ground at upwards of 500 miles per hour, crashing in a rural field near Shanksville in western Pennsylvania at 10:10 a.m.
All 44 people aboard were killed. Its intended target is not known, but theories include the White House, the U.S. Capitol, the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland or one of several nuclear power plants along the eastern seaboard.
Scroll to Continue
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READ MORE: What Was Flight 93's Target?
How Many People Died in the 9/11 Attacks?
A total of 2,996 people were killed in the 9/11 attacks, including the 19 terrorist hijackers aboard the four airplanes. Citizens of 78 countries died in New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania.
At the World Trade Center, 2,763 died after the two planes slammed into the twin towers. That figure includes 343 firefighters and paramedics, 23 New York City police officers and 37 Port Authority police officers who were struggling to complete an evacuation of the buildings and save the office workers trapped on higher floors.
At the Pentagon, 189 people were killed, including 64 on American Airlines Flight 77, the airliner that struck the building. On Flight 93, 44 people died when the plane crash-landed in Pennsylvania.
America Responds to the Attacks
At 7 p.m., President George W. Bush, who was in Florida at the time of the attacks and had spent the day being shuttled around the country because of security concerns, returned to the White House.
At 9 p.m., he delivered a televised address from the Oval Office, declaring, “Terrorist attacks can shake the foundations of our biggest buildings, but they cannot touch the foundation of America. These acts shatter steel, but they cannot dent the steel of American resolve.”
In a reference to the eventual U.S. military response he declared, “We will make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbor them.”
Operation Enduring Freedom, the American-led international effort to oust the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and destroy Osama bin Laden’s terrorist network based there, began on October 7. Within two months, U.S. forces had effectively removed the Taliban from operational power, but the war continued, as U.S. and coalition forces attempted to defeat a Taliban insurgency campaign based in neighboring Pakistan.
Osama bin Laden, the mastermind behind the September 11th attacks, remained at large until May 2, 2011, when he was finally tracked down and killed by U.S. forces at a hideout in Abbottabad, Pakistan. In June 2011, then-President Barack Obama announced the beginning of large-scale troop withdrawals from Afghanistan; it took until August 2021 for all U.S. forces to withdraw.
Department of Homeland Security Is Created
In the wake of security fears raised by 9/11 and the mailing of letters containing anthrax that killed two and infected 17, The Homeland Security Act of 2002 created the Department of Homeland Security. It was signed into law by President George W. Bush on November 25, 2002. Today, the Department of Homeland Security is a cabinet responsible for preventing terror attacks, border security, immigrations and customs and disaster relief and prevention.
The act was followed two days later by the formation of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States. The bipartisan “9/11 Commission,” as it came to be known, was charged with investigating the events that lead up to September 11th. The 9/11 Commission Report was released on July 22, 2004. It named Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind behind 9/11, “the principal architect of the 9/11 attacks.”
Mohammed led propaganda operations for al Qaeda from 1999-2001. He was captured on March 1, 2003 by the Central Intelligence Agency and Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence and interrogated before being imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay detention camp with four other accused terrorists charged with 9/11-related war crimes. The use of torture, including waterboarding, during Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s interrogation has received international attention. In August 2019, a U.S. military court judge in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba set a trial date for Mohammed and the other four men charged with plotting the 9/11 terrorist attacks to begin in 2021; it was later postponed because of the c-19 pandemic.
Economic Impact of 9/11
The 9/11 attacks had an immediate negative effect on the U.S. economy. Many Wall Street institutions, including the New York Stock Exchange, were evacuated during the attacks. On the first day of trading after the attacks, the market fell 7.1 percent, or 684 points. New York City’s economy alone lost 143,000 jobs a month and $2.8 billion wages in the first three months. The heaviest losses were in finance and air transportation, which accounted for 60 percent of lost jobs. The estimated cost of the World Trade Center damage is $60 billion. The cost to clean the debris at Ground Zero was $750 million.
READ MORE: 5 Ways 9/11 Changed America
9/11 Victim Compensation Fund
Thousands of first responders and people working and living in lower Manhattan near Ground Zero were exposed to toxic fumes and particles emanating from the towers as they burned and fell. By 2018, 10,000 people were diagnosed with 9/11-related cancer.
From 2001 to 2004, over $7 billion dollars in compensation was given to families of the 9/11 victims and the 2,680 people injured in the attacks. Funding was renewed on January 2, 2011, when President Barack Obama signed The James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act into law. Named for James Zadroga, a New York City Police officer who died of respiratory disease he contracted after rescuing people from the rubble at Ground Zero, the law continued health monitoring and compensation for 9/11 first responders and survivors.
In 2015, funding for the treatment of 9/11-related illness was renewed for five more years at a total of $7.4 billion. The Victim Compensation Fund was set to stop accepting claims in December 2020.
On July 29, 2019, then-President Trump signed a law authorizing support for the September 11 Victim Compensation Fund through 2092. Previously, administrators had cut benefits by up to 70 percent as the $7.4 billion fund depleted. Vocal lobbyists for the fund included Jon Stewart, 9/11 first responder John Feal and retired New York Police Department detective and 9/11 responder Luis Alvarez, who died of cancer 18 days after testifying before Congress.
9/11 Anniversary and Memorial
On December 18, 2001, Congress approved naming September 11 “Patriot Day” to commemorate the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. In 2009, Congress named September 11 a National Day of Service and Remembrance.
The first memorials to September 11 came in the immediate wake of the attacks, with candlelight vigils and flower tributes at U.S. embassies around the world. In Great Britain, Queen Elizabeth sang the American national anthem during the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. Rio de Janeiro put up billboards showing the city’s Christ the Redeemer statue embracing the New York City skyline.
For the first anniversary of the attacks in New York City in 2002, two bright columns of light were shot up into the sky from where the Twin Towers once stood. The “Tribute in Light” then became an annual installation run by the Municipal Art Society of New York. On clear nights, the beams are visible from over 60 miles away.
A World Trade Center Site Memorial Competition was held to select an appropriate permanent memorial to the victims of 9/11. The winning design by Michael Arad, “Reflecting Absence,” now sits outside the museum in an eight-acre park. It consists of two reflecting pools with waterfalls rushing down where the Twin Towers once rose into the sky.
The names of all 2,983 victims are engraved on the 152 bronze panels surrounding the pools, arranged by where individuals were on the day of the attacks, so coworkers and people on the same flight are memorialized together. The site was opened to the public on September 11, 2011, to commemorate the 10-year anniversary of 9/11. The National September 11 Memorial & Museum followed, opening on the original World Trade Center site in May 2014. The Freedom Tower, also on the original World Trade Center site, opened in November 2014.
Photo Galleries
9/11: World Trade Center
Aerial View Of Manhattan Shows Smouldering World Trade City
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15 Images
9/11: FDNY
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9/11: The Pentagon
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12 Images
9/11: Flight 93
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7 Images
The President on 9/11
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9/11 Lost and Found: The Items Left Behind
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Sources
"Study Confirms 9/11 Impact on New York City Economy." The New York Times
"September 11: nearly 10,000 people affected by 'cesspool of cancer.'" The Guardian.
"Congress passes 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund extension championed by Jon Stewart." CNN.com
The Encyclopedia of 9/11. New York Magazine.
FAQ About 9/11. 9/11 Memorial.
September 11th Terror Attacks Fast Facts. CNN.
9/11 Death Statistics. StatisticBrain.com.
HISTORY Vault
Citation Information
Article Title
September 11 Attacks
Author
History.com Editors
Website Name
HISTORY
URL
https://www.history.com/topics/21st-century/9-11-attacks
Access Date
22 July 2022
Publisher
A&E Television Networks
Last Updated
September 22, 2021
Original Published Date
February 17, 2010
By
History.com Editors
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Americana (culture)
Apple pie, baseball and the United States flag are three well-known American cultural icons.
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Americana artifacts are related to the history, geography, folklore, and cultural heritage of the United States of America. Americana is any collection of materials and things concerning or characteristic of the United States or of the American people, and is representative or even stereotypical of American culture as a whole.[1][2]
What is and is not considered Americana is heavily influenced by national identity, historical context, patriotism and nostalgia. The ethos or guiding beliefs or ideals which have come to characterize America, such as The American Dream, are central to the idea. Americana encompasses not only material objects but also people, places, concepts and historical eras which are popularly identified with American culture.
The name Americana also refers to Americana music, a genre of contemporary music that incorporates elements of various American music styles, including country, roots rock, folk, bluegrass, and blues, resulting in a distinctive roots-oriented sound.[3][4]
As nostalgia
From the mid to late 20th century, Americana was largely conceptualized as a nostalgia for an idealized life in small towns and cities in the United States around the turn of the century, roughly in the period between 1880 and the First World War, popularly considered "The Good Old Days".[5] It was believed that much of the structure of 20th-century American life and culture had been cemented in that time and place. American author Henry Seidel Canby wrote:
It is the small town, the small city, that is our heritage. We have made twentieth-century America from it, and some account of these communities as they were ... we owe our children and grandchildren.[6]
American historian Hampton Sides wrote in Americana: Dispatches from the New Frontier:
The United States of America is such a glorious mess of contradiction, such a crazy quilt of competing themes, such a fecund mishmash of people and ideas, that defining us is pretty much pointless. There is, of course, a kind of faded notion of "Americana", one that concerns Route 66, diners, freak rock formations, and the like—but even in its halcyon days this "roadside attraction" version of America was never an accurate or nuanced distillation of our massively complicated culture.
There are scenes and places, wattages and personages, that belong—inextricably, unmistakably—to this country alone. There is an American quality, a tone, an energy ... instantly recognizable ..."[7][page needed]
Many kinds of cultural artifacts fall within the definition of Americana: the things involved need not be old, but are usually associated with some quintessential element of the American experience. Each period of United States history is reflected by the advertising and marketing of the time, and the various types of antiques, collectibles, memorabilia and vintage items from these time periods are typical of what is popularly considered Americana. The Atlantic described the term as "slang for the comforting, middle-class ephemera at your average antique store—things like needle-pointed pillows, Civil War daguerreotypes, and engraved silverware sets".[8]
The nostalgia for this period was based on a remembrance of confidence in American life that had emerged during the period due to such factors as a sense that the frontier had finally been "conquered", with the U.S. Census Bureau's declaration that it was "closed" in 1890, as well as the recent victory in the Spanish–American War.[5] By 1912, the contiguous United States was at last fully politically incorporated, and the idea of the nation as a single, solid unity could begin to take hold.
As Canby put it,
Americans at this time "really believed all they heard on the Fourth of July or read in school readers. They set on one plane of time, and that the present, the Declaration of Independence, the manifest destiny of America, the new plumbing, the growth of the factory system, the morning paper, and the church sociable. It was all there at once, better than elsewhere, their own, and permanent. ... They had just the country they wanted...and they believed it would be the same, except for more bathtubs and faster trains, forever ... for the last time in living memory everyone knew exactly what it meant to be an American."[6]
On growing up Italian-American, novelist Don DeLillo stated:
It’s no accident that my first novel was called Americana. This was a private declaration of independence, a statement of my intention to use the whole picture, the whole culture. America was and is the immigrant's dream, and as the son of two immigrants I was attracted by the sense of possibility that had drawn my grandparents and parents.
— Conversations With Don DeLillo[9]
The zeitgeist of this idealized period is captured in the Disneyland theme park's Main Street, U.S.A. section (which was inspired by both Walt Disney's hometown of Marceline, Missouri and Harper Goff's childhood home of Fort Collins, Colorado),[10] as well as the musical and movie The Music Man and Thornton Wilder's stage play Our Town.[5] Especially revered in nostalgic Americana are small-town institutions like the barber shop,[11] drug store, soda fountain and ice cream parlor;[12] some of these were eventually resurrected by mid-twentieth century nostalgia for the time period in businesses like the Farrell's Ice Cream Parlour chain, with its 1890s theme.[13]
Examples
Cultural symbols
The Statue of Liberty
The U.S. flag, and Old Glory in particular
"The Star-Spangled Banner"
The Fourth of July
Apple pie
Cowboy
Baseball
Cheerleading
White picket fence[14]
Religious camp meeting[15]
Tent revival[15]
Brand names
Coca-Cola[16][17]
Levi's blue jeans, especially Levi's 501s[17][18]
Budweiser
Jim Beam
Jack Daniel's
Marlboro
Harley-Davidson
Ford
Chevrolet
Nike
See also
History of immigration to the United States
Culture of the United States
Folklore of the United States
History of the United States
American studies
Transcendentalism
Romanticism
Black Americana
Similar concepts
Australiana, for cultural artifacts from Australia
Canadiana, for cultural artifacts from Canada
Communist nostalgia, a similar concept in former or currently communist countries
Floridiana, artifacts relating to the state of Florida.
Hawaiiana, Native Hawaiian cultural artifacts from the U.S. state of Hawaii.
Kiwiana, for cultural artifacts from New Zealand (Kiwi being a nickname for New Zealanders).
Ostalgie, a similar concept in East Germany
PRL nostalgia, a similar concept in Poland
Rhodesiana, a similar concept in Zimbabwe relating to items made in its colonial (Rhodesia) era
Soviet nostalgia, a similar concept in the former Soviet Union
Yugo-nostalgia, a similar concept in the former Yugoslav states
References
"Americana". Merriam-Webster Dictionary.
"Americana". Dictionary.com Unabridged (Online). n.d.
Shriver, Jerry (31 August 2009). "Grammys will be putting Americana on the map". USA Today.
"2011 Grammy Category Descriptions" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 3 January 2015. Retrieved 18 December 2012.
Sears, Stephen (1975). Hometown U.S.A. New York: American Heritage. pp. 6–9. ISBN 0-671-22079-9.
Canby, Henry Seidel (1934). The Age of Confidence: Life in the Nineties. New York: Farrar & Rinehart. ASIN B000857UVO.
Sides, Hampton (2007). Americana: Dispatches from the New Frontier. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1400033553.
Giovanni Russonello (August 2013). "Why Is a Music Genre Called 'Americana' So Overwhelmingly White and Male?". The Atlantic.
DeLillo, Don (January 13, 2005). Conversations with Don DeLillo. University Press of Mississippi. p. 88. ISBN 1578067049.
"Local History Archive Larimer Legends – Old Town & Disneyland – City of Fort Collins, Colorado". Library.ci.fort-collins.co.us. Archived from the original on 2009-01-25. Retrieved 2013-12-19.
Sears, Stephen (1975). Hometown U.S.A. New York: American Heritage. pp. 12–13, 29. ISBN 0-671-22079-9.
Sears, Stephen (1975). Hometown U.S.A. New York: American Heritage. pp. 12–13, 20. ISBN 0-671-22079-9.
"Farrell's looks to restart growth Owner outlines expansion plans for iconic ice cream chain". Nation's Restaurant News. August 31, 2010. Retrieved 4 June 2014.
Xiong, Nzong (2008-03-03). "White picket fences appease homeowners". TuscaloosaNews.com. McClatchy-Tribune News Service. Archived from the original on 2015-09-02. "Americana aside, people like white picket fences for a couple of practical reasons."
Stoutland, Frederick A. (2006). Landscapes of Christianity. FAS Publishing. p. 361. ISBN 9780977234103.
Correspondent, DON MELVIN, Atlanta. "COCA-COLA A SIP OF AMERICANA THINGS HAVE BEEN GOING BETTER WITH COKE SINCE 1886". Sun-Sentinel.com.
Day, Sherri; Elliott, Stuart (10 January 2003). "THE MEDIA BUSINESS: ADVERTISING; Coca-Cola goes back to its 'Real' past in an effort to find some new fizz for its Classic brand. - The New York Times". The New York Times.
"The Americana Essentials That Will Literally Never Go Out of Style | Complex". Complex Networks.
External links
Look up Americana or americana in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Americana.
Merriam-Webster definition of "Americana"
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