This year marks the 20th anniversary of 9/11. At 7:00pm on September 11, in The Park at City Center, the City of Woodstock will remember those we lost 20 years ago and honor our first responders — police, fire, and emergency personnel — as well as the service men and women who continue to serve, fight, and sacrifice for our freedom and safety.
Since September 11, 2006, the City of Woodstock has hosted the 9/11 Day of Remembrance Ceremony. This annual observance stands as a solemn reminder that we should not take our freedoms for granted.
People often wonder how the 9/11 memorial in The Park at City Center came to be. In 2016, a resident of Woodstock made City leaders aware of a newspaper article concerning the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey distributing artifacts salvaged from Ground Zero after the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center. Distribution of these artifacts was being offered to remind future generations of the events that occurred on September 11, 2001.
Mayor Donnie Henriques sent a letter to the Port Authority requesting that the City of Woodstock be considered for an artifact. Several months went by before notification was received that Woodstock had been selected to receive two 12-foot sections of subway track that were from the subway station located beneath the World Trade Center.
On May 25, 2016, two Woodstock Public Works employees attended a ceremony at JFK International Airport in New York and retrieved the sections of track from a storage facility to bring to Woodstock. A permanent memorial was designed, which is in The Park at City Center in downtown Woodstock. The memorial serves as a reminder to generations of Woodstock residents of that fateful day when some 3,000 people lost their lives in the largest terrorist attack ever on our nation's soil.
Please join fellow Woodstock citizens for this year's 9/11 Day of Remembrance Ceremony. Woodstock Parks and Recreation will be giving away commemorative lapel pins to attendees while supplies last.