Newtown Teen Launches Fundraiser—

Honoring Our Collective 9/11 Memory

Penny By Penny

By Shannon Hicks

Patrick Briscoe is thinking big, but going small with a request for donations from fellow Newtown residents.

Patrick has launched something he is calling The Forget Me Not 9/11 Memorial Fund. The fund was started recently with a goal of collecting 10,000 pennies so that his hometown will be represented within The National September 11 Memorial & Museum.

As work progresses in Manhattan on the museum, which is scheduled to be dedicated on the tenth anniversary of the attacks of September 2001, Patrick has taken it upon himself to make sure at least one cobblestone honors Newtown. Decorated coffee cans have been placed at St Rose School, where Patrick is a seventh grade student; as well as C.H. Booth Library, 25 Main Street; Bagel Delight, 30 Church Hill Road; and The Newtown Bee, 5 Church Hill Road. Residents are just being asked, as the name of the collection implies, to drop their pennies into a can.

“The Forget Me Not Pennies Fund name is based on the fact that if we all contribute pennies, they can be combined for a greater good,” said Patrick, 13.

“The goal of the fund,” he continued, “it to collect at least 10,000 pennies in order to purchase a cobblestone on the pathway of the National 9/11 Memorial Museum in New York City. This cobblestone would be dedicated on behalf of Newtown so that we may never forget the victims of 9/11.”

Like countless other families, the Briscoes have a special connection to the former Twin Towers. Patrick’s parents, Liz and Pat, both worked at one point in the Towers. Their first date, in fact, was at the Towers.

“If it wasn’t for the World Trade Center, Patrick wouldn’t be here,” said Liz Briscoe, Patrick’s mother.

Patrick’s grandfather, John McNulty, who also lives in Newtown, also worked at the historic buildings. A retired mechanical engineer, Mr McNulty worked for 20 years on the 91st floor of the South Tower in an office that overlooked the Statue of Liberty. He was working there, in fact, on February 26, 1993, when the first attack on the Trade Center occurred.

“My family knew many victims of 9/11 and brave rescue workers who worked during the recovery efforts,” said Patrick, who was 3 years old and home sick from preschool the day of the attacks. He was too young to fully comprehend what was happening at the time, but says his parents have always stressed the importance of never forgetting what happened that day, and to never forget the victims.

The Briscoes own a tile from the floor of one of the towers and an American flag that flew during the recovery efforts following 9/11. A relative who worked during the recovery acquired them for the family. They serve as a regular reminder for Liz and Pat and their children, Patrick, Emma, and Thomas, of the attacks and those who died.

Last fall Patrick watched a program on TV that covered the museum’s planning and construction. What really caught his attention was a donation that had been made at the 9/11 Memorial Preview site.

“An anonymous person gave $10,000 cash,” said Patrick. “They stuffed it into a small donation box. I was very impressed by that person’s generosity.”

Patrick and his parents, he said, discussed that act over many dinners.

The September 11 Museum will be, says planners, “the authoritative source for an evolving understanding of the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and 1993.” Located on the footprints of the former buildings, the museum and its surrounding memorial space will include a growing collection of diverse artifacts, photographs, audio and video tapes, personal effects and memorabilia, expressions of tribute and remembrance, recorded testimonies and digital files and websites related to the history of the World Trade Center, the events of September 11, 2001, and February 26, 1993, and the repercussions of the two terrorist attacks.

The memorial will consist of two massive pools (each approximately one acre in size) set within the footprints of the Twin Towers. The pools will host the largest manmade waterfalls in the country cascading down their sides.

The names of the nearly 3,000 individuals who were killed in the September 11 attacks in New York City, Pennsylvania, and at the Pentagon, as well as in the February 1993 World Trade Center bombing, have been inscribed on bronze parapets surrounding the twin pools.

Cobblestones and pavers will line the eight-acre landscaped Memorial Plaza, where nearly 400 trees are being planted to create “a contemplative space separate from the sights and sounds of the surrounding city,” according to the memorial’s website (www.National911Memorial.org).

While the cobblestones will not have inscriptions on them — the only names that will appear in the memorial will be those to whom the memorial is honoring — kiosks to be set up on Memorial Plaza will allow visitors to locate the stones they have sponsored.

Patrick did some research after watching the documentary about the museum and memorial, and that was when he learned of the cobblestones and the sponsorships available for them. That was when The Forget Me Not Pennies Fund was created.

“He has never done anything like this before,” said Liz Briscoe. “This is all his idea, and his doing. We’re very proud of him.””

Patrick will receive a cobblestone membership card with the identifying stone number on it, and Newtown will be acknowledged on the memorial’s website.

The Memorial will be dedicated on September 11, in a ceremony for victims’ families. Beginning September 12, the public may visit the Memorial with a reserved visitor pass. Construction to complete the full museum and memorial is expected to continue until 2014.

The Forget Me Not Pennies 9/11 Memorial Fund had reached about $20, Patrick estimated, by last week. Patrick feels confident that his penny drive will be a success.

“It’s the little things that count,” he said. “If we all contribute our pennies, they will be combined for a greater good.”