Press

Although it's been nearly two years since the September 11th World Trade Center (WTC) attack, many are still focused on what they can do to memorialize this unprecedented event, as evidenced by the number of donations New York State Museum curators continue to receive for the museum's ever growing WTC Response collection.

The remaining items of one of the larger and most significant donations to the museum's collection came recently from the former Nino's restaurant in lower Manhattan, the legendary respite area for rescue and recovery workers, donated by the owner Antonio Nino Vendome.

The museum also has collected and documented memorials and memorial objects from Liberty Plaza (the memorial fence); St. Paul's Chapel; the Fresh Kills Landfill recovery operation; the New York State Office of Taxation and Finance, which led the WTC relief fund effort; the Salvation Army; students' art work from the New York State Art Teachers Association, the New York City fire and police departments and many individuals and organizations throughout the country and across the world.

"Deciding what to collect from this unprecedented event in New York's history was an incredible challenge for our team of curators," said Dr. Clifford Siegfried, museum director. "Almost two years later, the perspective has already changed and some items considered too sensitive are now considered essential to telling the story. We had to think about what museum visitors will be interested in 100 years from now and what objects would best represent the incredible response from people all over the world to the tragic events and aftermath of September 11th."

This past summer, a team consisting of State Museum and New-York Historical Society staff and Siena College students went to New York City to assist the New York Fire Department organize and catalogue 150 boxes of memorial items. There was a huge influx of sympathy cards
and other items that came to the fire department on last year's 9-1-1 anniversary and they still
continue to arrive.

There also are tens of thousands of items in the museum's WTC Response collection but only a small portion of them will make it to the exhibit floor at any one time. Items are rotated in and out of the Response section of the museum's permanent exhibition - The World Trade Center Rescue Recovery Response, which opened a year ago.

One of the first donations from Nino's, which is on display in the exhibition, is the "Statue of Liberty" from Nino owner Antonio Nino Vendome. He had closed his restaurant on Canal Street, just a short walk from Ground Zero, on September 12, 2001 after deciding to convert it into a refuge site where hot meals would be provided meals 24 hours a day, seven days a week to uniformed rescue and recovery workers. He found the statue, which had once been an advertisement for coca-cola, as he was searching in the restaurant basement for tables to set up a buffet line. Nino thought the statue would help to inspire the rescue effort and relocated it to the Canal Street sidewalk outside the restaurant.

Others soon matched Vendome's goodwill efforts. Volunteers came forward to assist in the effort, including former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, other celebrities, organizations and ordinary citizens. There also were donations of food, beverages, handmade placemats, pie plates, aprons etc. One person drove from Texas to donate barbecue equipment.

With the help of thousands of volunteers, "Nino's American Kitchen" provided more than a half million free meals until the recovery work at Ground Zero ended in the summer of 2002. A few months later the restaurant closed permanently as many other businesses in the area were forced to do because the WTC and other offices, which had once supplied steady customers, were now closed.

The Smithsonian, State Museum, New-York Historical Society and other museums have accepted memorabilia from Nino's, which will help to tell its story to present and future generations. The State Museum has the majority of items, -- five truckfuls that include a portion of the 30-foot polished wooden bar, food service equipment, tables and serving dishes. There also is another significant part of the collection, some of which hung on the walls of the restaurant, and help to capture the powerful emotions associated with September 11th. These memorial items arrived from across the country and around the world, including cards, letters, drawings, paintings, banners, plaques, quilts and a variety of other handmade items, including an origami crane from students in Japan.

Some items from the Nino's collection will be rotated into the Response section of the State Museum's WTC exhibition at some point in the future, along with the other memorabilia that has come into the collection.

Items currently on exhibit include a collection of crosses and medallions made from WTC metal debris by New York City sanitation workers; safety vests from the Northeastern Association for the Blind; a Manhattan skyline model made by Rolando Guzman, a Honduran immigrant; cap collection and "Bloom Again" photograph from Bobby Dick of Glens Falls; stuffed animals sent to firehouses throughout New York City; fire helmets decorated by expressions of sympathy, including one form England and a "Dove with Olive Branch" banner made by children from York, Pa.

Other objects in the collection include a "9-1-1" painting by Piero Capobianco of East Seattle, Washington; prayer rug from Afghanistan; sympathy material from Union Square and "Hindsight" (mixed media) from Kelly Ryan of Stillwater.

The New York State Museum is located on Madison Avenue in Albany. It is open 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. seven days a week throughout the year except on Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's Day. Further information about programs and events can be obtained by calling (518) 474-5877 or visiting the museum website at www.nysm.nysed.gov.