Russ Zimmer

@RussZimmer

This story was originally published on Sept. 11, 2016 to mark the 15th anniversary of the attacks.

For days after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, cars sat unclaimed in the parking lot at Middletown's train station. It would eventually become clear that their owners were never coming back, not to their vehicles and not to their homes and families.

The lives of more than three dozen people — executives, assistants, mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, all from Middletown — were ripped away on Sept. 11, 2001. Few places outside of New York City's five boroughs lost more souls.

The World Trade Center is 22 miles due north of Monmouth County's most expansive and populous town. The burning towers were visible from the Bayshore and the higher elevation points in the east near Hartshorne Woods. But that proximity alone doesn't explain the heartache.

MIddletown is a commuter haven, but 37 of those people working in the city never made the trip home that day, even as the smoke and ash — carried by a north-to-south wind — drifted over the bay and into Middletown.

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The Asbury Park Press interviewed 20 people from Middletown from various perspectives and asked them what they remember most vividly about Sept. 11 and the days that followed. Here are their memories:

Elaine Chevalier, mother of Swede Joseph Chevalier, 26, an assistant trader at Cantor Fitzgerald who was killed in the attack: "I picked up my younger daughter, who was a sophomore at Red Bank Regional. As we were going over the Oceanic Bridge, my daughter is saying 'Look, look you can see the smoke.' I couldn't even look. When we got home, I couldn’t put the TV on, I tried never to watch the tower’s going down, but it was all over the place. I couldn't imagine that my beautiful 26-year-old son, who was beautiful in all ways — physically and in spirit — was in there. ... He was a wonderful human being. I want him to be remembered as that.”

Watch the video above for a tour of the Middletown WTC Memorial Gardens. The town is hosting a remembrance ceremony at 7 p.m. tonight, Monday, Sept. 11, 2017, at the gardens, which is next to the Middletown Arts Center at 36 Church St. All are welcome.

Barbara Marcus, 53, IT recruiter at a firm on Broadway on 9/11: "I was coming up the escalator, exiting the PATH (at the World Trade Center) when the first plane hit. One of the things I remember was that it was a beautiful day. The sky was so blue, you couldn’t ask for a more perfect day. The cloud that came from the building was so black above and there was the blue sky beyond it and you just ran toward the blue as fast as you could.”

Chris Bonin, 55, IT director in the NYC Office of Emergency Management on 9/11: "I was listening to WPLJ when they announced the first impact and I looked up. I was coming from the Parkway onto the Turnpike. There is a rise there and you can see the buildings off in the distance and I could see the tower burning. From that distance it looked like a cigarette standing on one end, burning."

Patty Bickauskas, 57, operations manager in Eatontown on 9/11: "My husband (Alan Bickauskas) was a captain on one of the New York Waterway ferries that day. He called me at work to tell me a plane had just hit the one tower. We all thought it was a piper cub or small plane. We turned on the TV and began watching in horror. Next thing we see is the second plane hit and then the TV went to all snow."

Tayler Torres, 22, student at Bayview Elementary School on 9/11: "Although I was only in second grade, I remember students being called down to the office to be taken out of school early during our P.E. class. Upon returning to our classroom, our teacher had her television on with the news of the attacks before quickly shutting it off. I remember catching a glimpse of one of the towers on the TV and my teacher was crying with another teacher who was in the room."

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Debbie Mescal, 60, student-teacher on 9/11: "I was student teaching at Harmony School in Middletown on Sept.11. ... We were instructed to close all the blinds and to keep the children in the building; no recess or outdoor gym because the thick, black smoke could be seen in the sky. We were told not to discuss what happened with the students because many had parents that worked in the city."

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Judy Shaughnessy, 61, parent at Bayshore Middle School on 9/11: "I was on the committee to sell book socks — the fabric covers that you put over textbooks — and during the first week of school we would set up in the hallway so the students could come by and shop for the book socks that they need. While we were there, the school buzzer kept ringing. Finally, one of the mothers at the table went to check and she came back and said something had happened in Manhattan and that parents were coming by and getting their kids."

Rachael Memoli, 32, student at High School North on 9/11: "We were in the cafeteria and the principal got on the loud speaker and announced the World Trade Center was hit and it was a terrorist attack. Everyone started screaming. ... I saw one girl run into bathroom hysterical, crying and said her dad works there."

Heather Bell, 22, student on 9/11: "I was in 2nd grade at Port Monmouth Elementary. ... Most of us (students) got picked up early. When I got picked up, I asked my teacher what our homework was, and when she said there wasn't any I knew something really awful must have happened. When we got home there was ash on the lawn and I couldn't believe what my mom told me had happened. How could they just be gone?"

Robert Martin, 30, student at High School North on 9/11: "I was in freshman year of high school. My father took me, my siblings, and my cousins out of school that day. I remember him coming out of getting one of my cousins out of Thorne, and he was visibly shaken, more so than when he picked us up. It wasn't until later that I learned why — in a conversation between my parents I am sure I wasn't supposed to hear. He saw a young girl in the (Thorne) office when someone said the Twin Towers had been hit. 'But my dad works there,' is what my father heard her say."

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Vinny Smith, 66, health educator in Shrewsbury on 9/11: "There was a good amount of people up there (Mount Mitchell lookout), maybe 50 to 75. There were a couple of those tower viewers that you could look through for a closer look. People were on those, and they were sharing. Some wanted a closer look, but some people didn’t want that closer look."

Tayler Torres: "My father explained to me that that one of the buildings in New York City was on fire and took me to the Spy House in Port Monmouth to show me the smoke filling the sky. I was only 7 years old so I did not fully understand what had happened."

Kathy Pinnola, 52, banker on maternity leave on 9/11: "I walked into Dunkin' Donuts on Route 35 by Kings Highway. I was home on maternity leave, sleep-deprived and had no knowledge of what was going on. The woman in front of me in line was about 9 months pregnant and was crying. I asked her if she was OK and she said a plane had hit a World Trade Center tower and she couldn't reach her husband who worked there. She was clutching her cell phone. I asked her if I could do anything to help her and she said no. I still wonder what happened to her and her family."

Vinny Smith: "One woman was yelling into her cell phone 'Where are you? Where are you?' I guess she was trying to find somebody in that building. And she just kept yelling into the phone. I remember two women came over to console her."

Barbara Marcus: "There was one lady who was calling people’s families. It was like 'OK, what can I say so that people don’t think I’m crazy.' So she would call and say 'I’m with Leslie, she had spaghetti with you last night. She’s fine.'"

Glenn McCauley, 54, worked at Fort Monmouth on 9/11: "Down in Highlands at the Seastreak ramp, we loaded water, food, supplies and other things. and went to the dock at the bottom of the towers. We spent the day off-loading supplies and then went up (to Manhattan) and helped with buckets to move debris. We left at about 6 that night and when we docked in Highlands there were trucks of supplies donated by local businesses. We stayed to load up the boat then they went back to Manhattan."

Patty Bickauskas: "I didn't see my husband for the rest of the week as he helped get people on the ferry to get them out of Manhattan. He said people were jumping over the fence in Battery Park and they were picking them up out of the water and getting them on the ferry.Then he piloted the ferry to bring material over to help with the firefighters and rescue personnel. He passed away 3 ½ yrs ago from cancer."

Doug Corbet, 55, Middletown fire chief on 9/11: "(At the ferry terminals) it was all civilians who were just getting off the island whatever way they could. (Feds) told us they would be sending multiple ships. There would be hospital boats, and the chairs would be ripped out and there would just be bodies. That didn’t end up happening.”

Kevin Andrew, 30, student at High School North on 9/11: "At the time I was part of the Middletown Police Explorers. After school, we met up and made our way down to the Highlands ferry terminal and started helping people off the ferries that were coming in. I will never forget the looks on their faces as they were coming off the ferries. They were ones of shock and dismay."

Debbie Mescal: "At the time my paying job was at Riverview Medical Center and with an emergency situation like this all employees were expected to help out. ... There were a few patients who had been transported by boat into Atlantic Highlands. I spoke with a young Asian girl who had escaped and she told me that she just ran and ran and ran for the water and somehow ended up on a boat and then here."

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Barbara Marcus: “I was four months pregnant at the time. ... That was the first day I felt her kick. When I was on the PATH train on the way back. I thought 'Oh my god, she’s going to be OK.' ”

Chris Bonin: "I remember coming back to Middletown for the first time after two or three days of work. I got out of the car at my house and I remember dropping to my knees and the emotions hitting me and touching green grass for the first time. Just touching my lawn, I was home. I don’t know how to describe it. I don’t know what the significance of it was, I was just home."

Michele Williamson, 42, business owner on 9/11: "I own a restaurant in town (Fratelli’s Pizzeria). We were praying for the lives of our customers and friends that we knew worked there. Sadly, we lost some great friends. I remember waiting for a woman that came in every night for two slices of pizza, and just had a bad feeling."

Rosemarie Peters, 73, township committeewoman on 9/11: “That evening my husband and I took a ride over to the fishing pier in Port Monmouth. To get there we had to drive by the parking lot at the Middletown train station. The lot was mostly empty except for a small number of cars scattered here and there. It occurred to me that those cars very easily could have belonged to the victims.”

Joe Capriotti, MPTD Lt. Joe Capriotti,59: “Whenever an identification was made, the New York medical examiner or the New York Police they would call and say ‘Can you go over and let the family know that we’ve identified the remains?’ And that’s what happened, and kept happening, probably for two years later. ... (The first next-of-kin notification) was about two weeks after (a World Trade Center widow) had just given birth — to this day, she’s a good friend of mine. She was pregnant on 9/11 and her son was born, I want to say, a week later. Fortunately, her family was there with her, but we talked for about an hour.”

Elaine Chevalier, mother of 9/11 victim, Swede Joseph Chevalier: "We were in the city on Friday putting up posters, when we got the word that they had found his body. ... I was in bed for most of the weekend. In and out of it. I had this vivid dream. I call it a vision because I never had a dream like that before or since. Swede was in it and his face was so bright, almost florescent. Being a woman of faith, I had always prayed for the Archangel Raphael to care for him and he was there with his hand on (Swede's) shoulder. And his dog that he raised from a pup who had just passed a few months earlier.”

Rosemarie Peters: “The five members of the governing body, we decided that we would divide the responsibility and each go to different funerals. I went to three and they were absolutely the most difficult funerals I’ve ever gone to. Everybody was so emotionally raw and we were all experiencing every loss. Everyone was crying. Just crying, crying, crying. Three were a lot to bear emotionally, and I can only imagine what the families were going through."

Joe Capriotti: “Frequently I tried to take a clergy member with me on notifications, a Catholic priest or minister of whatever was appropriate for the family. People react differently in that situation a lot of times, especially as time went on. People had gone through the grieving process and begun to move on. Six months or a year later, there’d be a knock on the door — ‘Some remains of your loved one have been found’ — and it would just tear those wounds right open. There was one time a woman became violent and just started throwing furniture around.”

Elaine Chevalier: "Each 9/11 is great – it's painful – but it helps me refocus on trying to capture joy and love out of the ashes. Lost dreams of my son, what he could have been, the family he could have had — it's traumatic, but we have to do what we can while we are here."

Joe Capriotti: "My own family members had said to me over the years that I don’t know how much 9/11 changed me. Without a doubt, no matter how many times you have to tell somebody that their loved one had died in a violent manner. It doesn’t get any easier.”

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Russ Zimmer: 732-557-5748, razimmer@app.com