Elkhart, Indiana: Remembering Them By Name

Jon tossed his bag onto the bed near the window of our room at the South Bend Motel 6. He always picked the bed next to the window. I never asked why.

He reached into the side pocket of his bag and pulled out a small rectangle of gold metal. “Check it out,” he said, handing it to me. “Some random guy gave me this business card at a trade show somewhere.”

I read the name on the card. By now it was very familiar.

Jon took it back and stuck it in his wallet. “I didn’t think I’d ever need it but for some reason I held onto it.”

“Lucky you did,” I said.

Three years after that trade show Jon dug that very unusual card out of the top drawer of his studio desk and called the number etched in the corner. I wish I could have listened to the conversation that must have ensued.

In addition to the cross, Jon’s memorial would include a Book of Names; stainless steel pages etched with the names, in alphabetical order, of the 2,997 people lost on September 11th. This book would be bound with steel rings and placed in a small alcove built into the base on which the cross would stand. Jon knew he could make a fourteen-foot cross. For the fine, small-scale artistry required to etch those names in steel he’d have to find someone else.

Enter Dan Brekke, the guy with the metal business cards.

Dan greeted us outside his company, Indy Metal Etching, with a soft smile and a firm handshake. He was a pretty big guy, having played football for four years at Purdue. His wife Deanna, on the other hand, was as petite as a cheerleader. Her smile, though, was just as big as Dan’s.

After a few quick words they led us through the large bay door that was open to the driveway where we were parked. Inside was a sprawling room with long tables set up to display pictures showing, and explanations detailing, the work that went into the creation of the Book of Names. Front and center was the Book itself, some of the pages already bound together with the steel rings. Other pages lie off to the side, more names yet to be added before the installation in New York.

As Mr. Brekke showed Jon around the room his employees stood quietly by. “We’re so honored to be a part of this,” many of them said, already having lent an appreciable amount of time and skill to this contribution of theirs. In their eyes, in their faces and in the product of their labor was a visible sense of pride; their reward for saying yes to an idea that was not even fully formed when Jon dug that card out of his drawer.

Mike Compton, Chief of the Elkhart City Fire Department, would tell us later that in the immediate wake of 9-11 he knew he couldn’t just stand by and watch while so much was going on and so much help was needed. So he jumped in his truck and drove to New York City with fellow firefighter Matt Rody in the seat beside him. “To go help out, go do something," he said. He sounded like he still wished he could have done more.

“We worked from the 12^th to the 14^th, just doing whatever we could do,” Chief Compton explained. “Then went back the next week for three more days.”

In reliving some of the stress of those days he told us how, climbing through the wreckage, he found a hole in the rubble that reached four floors down. “By that time, with all the stuff in the air, we knew there was no way we were going to find anyone alive down there.”

In his eyes the regret still lingered.