Riverdale 9/11 memorial ceremony marks 25 years of remembrance and community

Friends of Riverdale 9/11 Memorial Garden — co-chaired by Laura Spalter and Mike Courtney — will host its sixth annual ceremony in Endor Garden at Fieldston Road and West 253rd Street on Friday, Sept. 11 at 5 p.m.

Spalter said attendees can expect the names of victims to be read aloud, remarks from first responders and religious leaders, musical performances, ceremonious tributes by the New York City Fire Department and a poem read by Beth Morris, author of “In the Aftermath: 9/11 Through a Volunteer’s Eyes.” Morris helped deliver supplies to first responders and recovery crews at ground zero for five months after the towers fell.

The ceremony is expected to run for about an hour. It is a time for solace and an opportunity to pay respects, Spalter said.

Three people will be added to the memorial garden’s sign this year, which lists local first responders and residents who died in the attacks, as well as other neighbors who died later in life due to 9/11-related illnesses. Those newly honored include Wally P. Travers, New York Police Department Lieutenant Thomas Docu and the New York City Fire Department’s Gerard R. Lennon.

The ceremony has only grown since it started in 2021, Spalter said. Back then, less than 100 people attended, a number that has since jumped to around 500, according to organizers.

In 2024, the garden received a meaningful addition: a piece of a steel beam from the World Trade Center, donated by the New York City Fire Department. Courtney, a retired firefighter of FDNY Engine Company 79 in Bedford Park, remembers what it was like to watch ironworkers cut through the wreckage.

Courtney was on duty in the days that followed the travesty — when efforts transitioned from rescuing live survivors to recovering human remains. It was the worst day of his life.

“I’ll never forget the smell of death coming up from the rubble,” Courtney said. “Fathers were down there looking for their sons.”

Every passerby reaches out to touch that piece of steel, said Courtney, who regularly tends to the garden. He thinks it connects them to a defining moment in the city’s history, or evokes memories for those who lived through it.

The memorial itself started shortly after 9/11, when a neighbor constructed a wooden plaque, Spalter said. It listed the names of five local firefighters and police officers who died that day, and remained there until 2017, when “as curiously as it once appeared, the memorial disappeared,” The Press previously reported.

At the time, Courtney attributed the memorial’s disappearance to a rise in crime, or to young people drinking in the park and fooling around. He put up a small replacement sign soon after, while Spalter and her husband vowed to make a new one if it wasn’t returned, The Press previously reported.

By 2021, the garden had become “some sort of de facto hangout,” The Press reported at the time, and was littered with garbage and old furniture. With the help of volunteers from Riverdale Country School and Tom Healey, a community member who runs the memorial garden at Inwood’s Church of the Good Shepherd, a restored garden and a new sign were unveiled in 2021 —  accompanied by the first ceremony.

As the 25th anniversary of 9/11 approached, Courtney noted that with each passing year, as the number of ceremony attendees grows, so does the number of names listed on the memorial sign. Garden visitors are evidence that Riverdale cares, that it remembers the lost friends, siblings and parents, he said.

“We’re all connected to the people on that board,” Courtney said.