As I reread the article that I wrote on the first anniversary of 9/11, my first thought was that “anniversary” is far too celebratory a word to apply to the occasion. My thesaurus offers some feeble replacements, but I’m going with “observance” from now on.

As we approach the 25th observance of this tragedy, I appreciate the opportunity to remember the subject of that piece, Tim O’Brien.

The original article introduced readers to this young athlete and his rapid ascent in the financial gladiators’ arena of Wall Street. For this follow-up, I learned that his legacy has been honored in a most appropriate way. His alma mater, Hartwick College, established a memorial prize in Tim’s honor that has been awarded to standout freshman athletes for two decades now.

I know this because I sent the article to the current basketball coach at Hartwick, Brad Cooper, hoping to “educate” him about a standout graduate of the past. Faster than I could utter “I shoulda known,” the reply came back to me from Coach Cooper who had full and immediate knowledge of Tim, as do dozens of student athletes who have received this award.

Coach Cooper assured me he would post the article in Hartwick’s social media on 9/11, lest anyone beyond the athletic circle forget. In a serendipitous aside, Coach Cooper let me know that he’s a Monticello High graduate, and a quick search revealed that he’s among that school’s top five basketball scorers.

Twenty-five years is a long time—a period beneficial to healing from deep personal loss but also a stretch that could lead to fading memories of our friends and family members affected by this calamity. Many who lost their lives that day are remembered at countless observances; I am glad that Tim O’Brien’s legacy of athletic and personal achievement is replayed annually in the basketball arena that helped shape his life. We have all heard for years that “sport builds character.” It was very satisfying for me to know someone whose life—short as it was—supports that theory.

Rest in peace, Tim.

Second Efforts

By CHRISTOPHER FREY, reprinted from Release & Recovery, September 2002

Since September 11, 2001 there have been millions of words written about the people who lost their lives in the World Trade Center (WTC), the Pentagon and the Pennsylvania plane crash. Some observers, particularly Peter Vescey of the NYT, have pointed out the number of serious athletes who perished may have been disproportionate to the number of serious athletes in the general population.

He made the case that the highly competitive world of finance attracted men and women who had already proven themselves in the arenas, courts and fields of the country’s universities, and who went on to high pressure trading desks and other businesses in the WTC, determined to transform their sweat and personal discipline into comfortable fortunes.

On the highest floors of the WTC that September day the bond brokerage offices of Cantor Fitzgerald were filled with those types of men and women—settling into a day of squinting at screens, shouting into phones and shepherding billions of dollars in split second transactions though the labyrinth of the world’s financial markets. 

And then they were gone.

I knew some of these people; I had worked with them for a couple of years before my wanderlust took over again. I can attest to their work ethic and drive. 

Interestingly, the primary thing I had in common with them was basketball. I had gotten my job through former college teammates who owned the firm. 

At mid-careers, these men and women had, indeed, broadened their horizons and, although they still scanned the sports scores first, their attention soon fell to the financial pages and hard news that would impact the markets at their fingertips. They had families and adult responsibilities, whopping mortgages and shrinking golf handicaps.

But today, one year later, as I think about the people I knew there, the metaphor that keeps coming to mind still involves basketball. You see, those men and women were the ball handlers and the scorers, and as those planes hurtled into the buildings and cut them off from the rest of their lives, there was simply no way to call “time out.”

So in the most basic basketball terms it is up to us—their friends, families and admirers—to be the rebounders. We have to grab that loose ball, keep it in play and put it back up again. There are more points to be scored, and, in their names, in honor of their memories, and buoyed by all the earthly evidence of their competitive spirits, we are obligated to play our roles in the world with the same spark and enthusiasm that they did. 

New York City and the rest of the country have been picking up and rebounding this year. The pain has been enormous and unprecedented, and some survivors remain in deep despair. For all the men and women who still had a pair of sneakers in a gym bag under their desks that awful morning, let us reach our hands out to all those still suffering and assure them that the game is still on and we are still competing.

There is no question that the same hero athletes who screamed “Let’s roll” that morning would be urging us all to “Pick up” and “Rebound” today.