Journeys of the Questress - WTC
The Winter Garden Springs To Life
Home
The Way it Was - 1
The Way it Was - 2
Sept 19 - When Tomorrow Never Comes
Sept 27 - Oral Interpretation
Oct 5 - A Mile of Tears - Part 1
Oct 5 - A Mile of Tears - Part 2
Oct 5 - A Mile of Tears - Part 3
Oct 11 - Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow
Oct 28 - Each Day I Search the Rubble
Nov 12 - When Spires Fall
Nov 19 - 911 The Rape of America
Dec 14 - Just A Thought
Dec 18 - A Sense of Place
Feb 2 - Final Pass to the End Zone
March 3 - Sitting on the Edge
March 14- Do You Still Remember
March 20 - Virtual Walk-Through
March 25 - When Will It End - Part 1
March 25 - When Will It End - Part 2
April 1 - Towers of Light
May 14 - View From Above
May 30 - Tunnel At the End of the Light
May 31 - Seventeen Hundred
Aug 9 - From the Margins Erased
Aug 30 - The Train Doesn't Stop There Anymore
Sept 9 - Ceremonies of Light and Dark
Sept 10 - Just An Anniversary
Sept 12 - September Holds Great Promise
Literary Reflections
Rebirth and Resurrection
The Winter Garden Springs To Life
The Winter Garden Springs To Life - con't
Underpass to the Past
Rebuilding Ground Zero
Under Hallowed Ground
Borders
Yahrzeit
What Will Fill the Void?
I Submit a Design
Footprints in the Dust
My Memorial Design Submission
My Memorial Design - Drawings
New Path Train Station
Path Station Tour
May We Never Forget
That Which Surives
War Without End
4th Anniversary
Footprints in the Dust
Void
I Miss 9/11
Time Comes Between Us
A Thousand Cranes
Fear Factor
Love Letters On The Wall
Empty Chairs
Sitting on the Edge of Forever
Walking the Perimeter of Emptiness
A Counting of Days
For Friends Absent But Not Forgotten
Stigmata
The Memory Keeper's Promise
Unbreak My Heart
Standing On The Edge Of Forever
Both Sides Now
A Memory In Time
The Gravity of Loss
The Survivors Rise Up
Flowers Will Bloom
The Fire Within Us
The Sentinel
Stronger Than The Storm
Between the Candle and the Stars
Ghosts
A Journey Through Remembrance
Canticle of Remembrance
Beyond the Crucible of Chaos
Journey Through Remembrance project
What See We Now
Forever In Our Hearts
Keeping the Flame Alive
The Rebuilding of Ground Zero continues
Does Anyone Care Anymore?
Where Is Our Story Teller of Pain
At Memory's Edge
Dust Thou Art and to Dust Thou Shalt Return
7x7x70
Heroes Never Die
The Flame Inside Our Hearts
The Year of the Heroes of 9/11
Déjà Vu
Remembering 9/11 in the year of COVID-19
Coronavirus Decimates Ailing Sept. 11 Responders
Touching From a Distance
That Which Survives 20 years later
2021 - 20 years later
Memories of Terror Return
Putin's Name Covered Over On Teardrop Memorial
The 9/11 Tribute Museum Closes
When Memories Fade Away
St. Nicholas at Ground Z is rebuilt
The Blue Wall of the Unidentified Victims
When Time Calls Your Name
When Art Gets It All Wrong

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The Winter Garden Springs to Life
If ever there was a rebirth and a resurrection here at Ground Zero or anywhere else in the city, it has to be the Winter Garden. This lovely space is technically not part of the Word Trade Center complex and Ground Zero. It is the huge enclosed atrium like space that was built between two of the World Financial Center buildings across from the World Trade Center complex. However, when the Towers fell, no such distinction was made. All the crashing debris crossed this demarcation line and landed on top of this beautiful space slashing the glass roof and crushing everything inside.
 
The back story of the Winter Garden pre 9/11
 
It was constructed when the World Financial Center was built with the intent of being a cross roads for traffic from the WTC, the WFC buildings, and the harbor outside. Via an enclosed bridge on the second floor, known as the North Bridge,  one could stroll over to the WTC area of the Custom's House and the North Tower. On either side of the Winter Garden's lower level there was access to the different shops and World Financial Center buildings. Through a huge 3 story glass facade, one could look out on to the harbor and the Hudson River. Go through the revolving doors and you were right there by the water with all the yachts and sailboats! Inside this glass domed marvel were huge palm trees. Specially planted deep within the marble flooring, they appeared to grow from it and stretch to touch the glass domed ceiling! From the second level where the revolving doors gave egress from the North Bridge was a flight of marble stairs. Coffee shops, restaurants, stores were on all levels.
This space also morphed into a performance area. A specially rigged stage, with huge canvas backdrops for sound absorption, was set up regularly in front of the harbor facade. Lights were hung from the roof and speakers placed for optimum sound acoustics. Folding chairs would be placed within the space between the palm trees and the performances would begin. Always free, funded by the corporations that inhabited the WFC. Dance, music, singers from other lands, wonderful entertaining diversity.
 
September 11, 2001
 
On 9/11/01 all that ended. The glass roof was smashed in. Many of the panes of glass on the front and rear facade were shattered. The debris and dust from the collapsing Towers filtered in and smothered the palm trees. The marble flooring was not only covered with the same dust but chunks of this and that landed on it and created cracks and crevices. Anyone seeing the early photographs could not believe this space was salvageable.
In December of 2001 I wandered into the harbor side area. The Winter Garden was totally surrounded by a plywood fence. You could smell the putridness rising from the inside. That wet smell of a building exposed to the elements. And perhaps of the dead palm trees. I cried. All those wonderful memories, gone, just like the Towers. But then I looked up and saw the most incongruous thing possible. 3 large Christmas wreaths (the ones that were always hung in the harbor side facade) were hung there and lit! A defiant gesture if there ever was one.

The Winter Garden Springs To Life - con't

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Pre 9/11/01 facing the harbor

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Pre 9/11/01 set up for a concert

A friend e-mailed me the following photograph last year shortly after 9/11 without any identification as to who the photographer is. I use it here because it so graphically displays the destruction of the Winter Garden. I would be glad to give credit if the photographer were known.

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After the Towers collapsed