Last Column Interactive Offers New Content

Throughout the nine-month rescue and recovery effort at Ground Zero, workers covered a 36-foot steel beam with mementos, memorial inscriptions and missing posters. Now known as the Last Column and on display in the 9/11 Memorial Museum’s Foundation Hall, the beam became a symbol of strength and resilience to many who worked at the site.

Museum visitors are invited to learn more about the Last Column tributes using interactive touchscreens. Four additional tributes were recently added for exploration:

Prayer card and portraits of Dennis Michael Edwards and Judson Cavalier: Edwards and Cavalier, born and raised in Huntington, N.Y., are commemorated on the Last Column with portraits and a prayer card dedicated to Edwards. On 9/11, Edwards was in his office on the 105th floor of the North Tower where he was a partner in government bonds at Cantor Fitzgerald while Cavalier was pursuing his work as a bond researcher at Sandler O’Neill & Partners on the 104th floor of the South Tower.

Firefighter Paul J. Pansini memorial card: A memorial card honors Pansini, a member of FDNY Engine Company 10. On 9/11, Pansini was covering a shift for FDNY Engine Company 26, located in midtown Manhattan, when that unit was dispatched to the World Trade Center. He was one of 36 FDNY firefighters posthumously promoted after 9/11, earning the rank of fire marshal.

International Union of Operating Engineers sticker: Operating cranes and other heavy machinery to move the wreckage in the effort to find survivors and victims, members of the International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) responded to the World Trade Center just hours following the attacks. Throughout the recovery period at Ground Zero, IUOE members removed debris, performed demolition and construction work and acted as foremen and project managers on behalf of various construction companies. After the end of formal recovery operations in May 2002, many members of the IUOE went on to participate in the construction of the new World Trade Center.

Joe Bradley signature: This marking was made by Joe Bradley, a member of the IUOE Local 15 who had worked on the construction of the original World Trade Center in the late 1960s. Bradley returned to the site on Sept. 12, 2001 to aid in rescue and recovery operations, initially operating a crane at Ground Zero to remove steel from the debris in hopes of finding survivors and continuing to work until the end of recovery operations in May 2002.

By 9/11 Memorial Staff