Snapshots: Newton 9/11 ceremony

Sept11-1

Newton 9/11 Memorial Committee member Tom Mountain speaks at the city's annual Sept. 11 ceremony. Photo by Bryan McGonigle

On Thursday, Newton officials took some time to remember lives lost in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, along with surviving family members at the Newton 9/11 Memorial, next to the Fire Department Headquarters on Centre Street.

Newton lost eight people that day 24 years ago:

Mark Bavis
Paige Farley-Hackel
Nicholas Humber
Aaron Jacobs
Stuart Meltzer
Richard Ross
Rahma Salie
Amy Toyen

Families of those lost took turns reading the text of the city’s 9/11 Memorial. And the ceremony paid gratitude to the first responders who lost their lives trying to save people that day.

“Every single day, they place themselves in harm’s way with courage and heroism, On that day, many gave their very lives so that others could live,” Rabbi Shalom Ber Prus said in delivering the Invocation.

Thursday’s guest speaker was conservative writer Rasheed Walters, who recalled witnessing the events of that day unfold as a child.

“As a 6-year-old, I really couldn’t grasp the complicated and complex issues that were taking place on that television screen, but my mother said something to me that I hold onto today that helped me understand that event,” he said. “She said to me, ‘Tonight, boys and girls that are your age will never see their parents ever again.’ That is something I held on to. And as a young man living in such a complicated world, it seems like we witness terrorist attacks almost every year.”

The Sept. 11, 2001, attacks killed 2,977 people: 2,753 in New York, 184 in Washington, D.C., and 40 on Flight 93, which crashed in Pennsylvania.

Here are some photos from Thursday’s ceremony.

Lucas Johnson reads the Pledge of Allegiance at Newton’s annual Sept. 11 ceremony. Photo by Bryan McGonigle

Rabbi Shalom Ber Prus delivers the Invocation with Tom Mountain and Mayor Ruthanne Fuller by his side at at Newton’s annual Sept. 11 ceremony. Photo by Bryan McGonigle