Mark Zupan, Alfred University president, spoke about his recollections of the 9-11 terrorist attack in a story published by the Hornell Evening Tribune.
The Evening Tribune, marking the 25th anniversary of 9/11, published a story on Friday, Sept. 11—titled “All we have is each other. What Hornell saw, said, and felt on 9/11”—in which local officials and residents offered their recollections of the day’s event.
Zupan was living in Tuscon, AZ, on Sept. 11, 2001, serving as dean of the Eller School of Management at the University of Arizona.
“I had just dropped off my youngest son at school when the news started filtering in from the East Coast about what first looked to be a plane crash into the World Trade Center and then we came to realize was a significant terrorist attack. The week before I had just flown to the NYC area for some meetings with alums and landed on a day as bright and crystal clear as 9/11 later proved to be,” Zupan recalled in the article. “Even though we were living in the Southwest, it was striking how tied we were to the tragedy that unfolded on 9/11.”
Zupan said people connected to the University of Arizona—a young alumnus and a man who had processed a gift bequest to the University—were working in the World Trade Center and perished in the attack. So, too, had a former student of Zupan’s from his time as a faculty member at the University of Southern California.
He said stories of the passengers’ heroic actions on United Flight 93, which crashed in Shanksville, PA, provided inspiration. A visit to the memorial in Shanksville during the COVID pandemic made Alfred University’s challenges “pale by comparison.”
"Notwithstanding the horrific losses, I have found ongoing solace and inspiration through the extent to which 9/11 served to unite our nation and the desire to remember each of the individuals whose lives came to an end on that day due to the terrorists."
