The Sept. 11 attacks undoubtedly changed America. But they also
had a profound impact on many San Benito County residents. This
week, look for 10 profiles on local residents whose lives changed
after the terrorist attacks a decade ago. The following are the
first three in the series.
Editor’s note: To commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the Free Lance and Pinnacle are running a special series profiling 10 locals whose lives have changed due to the events in 2001. Look for the remaining profiles in Friday’s Pinnacle.
A mother’s pride shines through
Ten years ago, Karol Burke’s daughter Andrea Walton had one focus in life. The 15-year-old San Benito High School student wanted to be a fashion designer. She and her mother had researched a summer institute in New York, and she had already selected the school she would attend after graduation.
“We were plotting all that out when Sept. 11 happened,” Burke said.
In an instance, her daughter changed her future career plans and decided she wanted to be a Marine.
“It was Sept. 11 and the terrorist attacks,” Burke said, of her daughter’s sudden interest in the military. “Like so many other youths, she wanted to do something to support her country.”
Walton did follow through with her desire to join the military, joining the Navy Junior ROTC that was offered at San Benito High School at the time. After graduation, she attended the Virginia Military Institute, which is an academy for students interested in any branch of the military.
Less than two weeks after graduating from VMI, she went to the Marine Corps. basic training at Quantico for six months. Now a first lieutenant., Walton was deployed to Afghanistan, from September 2010 to March 2011.
“I expected that to happen,” Burke said. “She’s in the military during a time of war. I expected it to be part of what she had to do.”
Before Walton’s deployment, Burke went to Yuma, Ariz., where her daughter had been working as a Marine air traffic controller to say goodbye. Burke surprised her by being in Yuma again when Walton returned.
“Her jaw was open when she walked up,” Burke said. “She said, ‘What are you guys doing here? I’m going to see you next week.'”
Burke said while her daughter was overseas, Walton posted updates on Facebook to let her family know she was okay. When she was close to the frontlines and had a lot of free time, she called home a lot, making three calls home in one day.
“I didn’t cry a single day when she was gone,” Burke said, who is involved with Blue Star Moms, a support group for families with people in the military. “I felt in my heart she would be fine and she would be home.”
Burke recalled what she felt when her daughter first said she wanted to join the military, in the aftermath of Sept. 11.
“Pride,” she said. “I said, ‘Okay.’ And she kind of got a look on her face and took a half step back in surprise. I think she was ready for an argument, but I had no problems with it.”
Burke, who is retired from the San Jose Police Department, said her own service as a police officer influenced her response.
“I felt pride that she wanted to do such a thing,” she said.
When Burke took Walton to Virginia for the second time, they stopped off at a local Harley dealership. Burke, who had ridden a motorcycle when she was younger, had just renewed her license in 2004.
“I hadn’t ridden in 29 years,” Burke said.
The dealership had a flier about America’s 9/11 Foundation’s annual motorcycle ride to the three crash sites. The ride raises money for scholarships for children of active first responders, such as firefighters, police officers and EMS.
“I came home very excited, and I said, ‘I need to do this,'” she said.
In 2007, she decided to do the ride for the first time. She flew out to Virginia and rented a motorcycle there. In 2009, she made it a cross-country ride as a retirement trip to herself.
“This year was a special year because it commemorates the 10th anniversary,” she said. “When we pulled out of the Pentagon, we had 1,700 bikes. By the time we got to Ground Zero, we had almost 2,800 people.”
She noted that the communities in many of the cities in which they stopped provided lunches and cleared the roads for the bikers to pass through.
“From Somerset to the Pentagon to Arlington, people lined the streets,” she said. “Holding flags, waving, clapping and holding up signs.”
United 93 victims’ loves ones become ‘like family’
They have become like family, those related to victims on the United 93 flight in the Sept. 11 attacks.
San Benito County’s Carol Heiderich and husband Bill would know. This week they will once again see others who lost family or friends in the terrorist attacks 10 years ago. They are traveling to Pennsylvania to take part in one of the many memorial ceremonies to commemorate the anniversary.
Heiderich’s brother, Jason Dahl, was the pilot of the United 93 flight that was hijacked and crashed after passengers tried to regain control of the airplane.
“The one thing,” Heiderich said, “we’ve met a lot of people, especially from flight 93. It’s kind of like a family in itself now. We’ve gotten to know each other well.”
Before taking their trip, Heiderich reflected on the past 10 years and her brother’s family-oriented life. Dahl was a San Jose native who had lived with his wife and then 15-year-old son in Colorado at the time of his death. Dahl was the captain of the flight, on which all 40 passengers and crew aboard died.
It has been comforting for Heiderich to meet loved ones of other victims, at memorials and other events following the tragedy. One family that really “hit home” was that of Nicole Miller, a 21-year-old West Valley College student on the flight.
“She was the young girl that lived in San Jose, more or less the same age as my kids,” she said. “That kind of hit home. We’ve gotten to know them. It turns out her mom and Jason actually graduated from the same high school.”
It is a fitting path, considering Dahl’s love for family. Heiderich reflected how he especially cared about his son Matt. Dahl was teaching him how to fly and was active with his Little League team. He once rearranged his schedule so he could be the pilot for his son’s field trip to Washington, D.C.
“His son was like the most important thing in his life,” she said.
Heiderich has learned from her brother’s generous nature. And from the Sept. 11 attacks, she has learned people can’t take life for granted.
“It is something we all need to remember,” she said. “We can’t forget what took place that day. America was under attack. We need to remember that and learn from that.”
Attacks resonated with local firefighter
On the other side of the country from the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, Fred Cheshire remembers hearing the bad news through a phone call from his mother on that fateful morning.
“It was an off-day for me,” said Cheshire, who was part of the Hollister Fire Department’s line personnel at the time and is now chief. “I had just gotten up and was going about my morning routine when my mom got a hold of me and said ‘Do you know what’s going on?'”
After having turned on the television to watch the events unfold, Cheshire remembers being “absolutely dumbfounded” watching the Twin Towers burn and eventually collapse.
“It was unreal to me,” he recalled. “As the towers fell, just knowing that there were people trying to evacuate and people trying to help people evacuate, it was just astounding.”
Then-Chief Bill Garringer talked with Hollister firefighters shortly after the attacks as he was “concerned how we were dealing with it emotionally,” Cheshire said. “It was impactful enough that the chief officer was paying attention to our mental health” in the wake of the attacks.
In the days, weeks and months that followed, Cheshire remembers local citizens taking the time to wave at fire personnel as their trucks rumbled through town, a sign of respect for first-responders that was repeated throughout the nation.
“Even though we were on the other coast, we were still heroes in people’s eyes,” he said. “We appreciated that, but this is something that firefighters anywhere around the world would do on any day for anyone.”
Local firefighters who have visited Ground Zero in Manhattan have come back to share their reaction and emotions with their colleagues in Hollister.
“That in itself was part of the healing process,” Cheshire said.
Hollister Fire crews are expected to be in attendance at the white dove release at noon at the Veterans Building in downtown Hollister on Sept. 11. The event, sponsored by the Hollister Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 9242, will feature the Pledge of Allegiance led by a Boy Scout troop; the national anthem; a prayer led by the Rev. Ardyss Golden; speakers from the fire and departments and the Red Cross; and a rifle salute and taps by the VFW with “Amazing Grace” played on the bag pipes.
The doves release is timed to coincide with numerous similar releases around the country to commemorate the 10-year anniversary of the tragedy.
