25 Years Later, 9/11’s Artifacts Still Call for a Different Level of Curatorial Care

Most objects, artworks and artifacts in museum displays are professionally cared for to one extent or another, but there are some memorial works and pieces of history that demand the most dedicated attention for the raw emotional response they inspire. As a general rule of thumb, the more recent the memory, the rawer it feels. The United States is observing the 25th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks this year, and every piece of building debris, each photograph and each homemade memorial to a civilian lost promises to stop viewers and draw forth the memory of where they were that clear September morning.

In the haze of war that followed 9/11, few outside of New York or Washington, D.C. tracked the cleanup or the cataloging of the tragedy’s aftermath. However, Aaron Noble, senior historian and curator of political and military history at the New York State Museum, told Observer that his institution began documenting the events of September 11 shortly after the attacks. “Under Section 233 of New York State Education Law, the State Museum is the primary repository for materials of historical significance generated by New York State agencies,” he explained. “Because the World Trade Center complex was operated by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, a bi-state governmental agency, it became apparent early on that the State Museum would need to be involved.”

According to State Museum records, representatives from the institution and the New York State Archives attended a meeting of museum professionals and archivists hosted at the Museum of the City of New York in October 2001 to discuss how cultural organizations should respond to the crisis. By November, museum staff were making visits to Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan and to the World Trade Center Recovery Operation at Fresh Kills on Staten Island.

“After careful conversation and consultation with FDNY, NYPD and FBI officials, the museum began collecting materials documenting the events of 9/11,” Noble said. “One of the main focuses of the recovery operation was to identify victims and belongings from victims and survivors, so the museum prioritized building components including glass, steel and façade fragments; items from first responders; and items that spoke to daily life at the World Trade Center or to daily office life.”

Noble described a scene in which recovery crews and museum staff developed a cooperative relationship, with workers setting aside materials that might be of interest to the museum, serving as de facto curators on the ground. Once artifacts were collected and venues across the country began to request pieces to display in their commemorations, it became necessary to extract them from the attack scene and transport them to their solemn destinations.

Jean-Christophe Thery, founder of MusaArtGallery, has decades of experience preparing fine art for shipping and managing its travel. He stressed that artifacts collected with an emphasis on preserving their physical significance and their context would demand cataloging to document provenance, condition, location of recovery and the circumstances surrounding an object’s use. But “beyond standard conservation considerations for significant historical objects, artifacts connected to 9/11 carry extraordinary emotional and cultural significance.”

Still, it’s the condition and material of each object that determines the specific conservation and handling requirements.” As an example, Noble pointed to the tracking and moving of the FDNY Engine 6 Pumper. “The museum was able to marshal resources and support from across the government to tackle materials that may have proven otherwise logistically challenging,” he says. “The Engine 6 Pumper was transported from Fresh Kills by soldiers of the New York National Guard 369th Sustainment Brigade with coordination and support from the Department of Transportation, Thruway Authority and New York State Police.”

From there, the truck was transported to Mid-Orange Correctional Facility, a since-closed prison where incarcerated individuals were trained in asbestos decontamination. After the abatement, the truck was transported to the State Museum in Albany. Similar interagency cooperation was vital for the transport of other materials, including fragments of steel columns from the World Trade Center towers, more than 1,800 of which are on display in museums, memorials and municipal spaces in the U.S. and abroad.

“Smaller items were transported by museum staff and were processed and cataloged in the same manner as all our museum collections,” Noble added. But the dust of 9/11 needed special handling. For families of the victims, that once ubiquitous dust is a sacred remnant of loved ones who died and whose bodies were never recovered. At the same time, the dust contains numerous toxic substances that could pose a risk to the museum’s staff and the visiting public. Both impact not just how certain objects are handled but also how they are displayed.

Even after 25 years, Noble and New York State Museum staff work with the surviving members of FDNY Engine 6, the families of the firefighters lost on 9/11 and other family groups and survivors to ensure that exhibit decisions are made thoughtfully, in ways that won’t traumatize visitors. “The State Museum is still in regular contact with family members, survivors and other organizations—such as the WTC Family Association, the now-closed 9/11 Tribute Museum and the National September 11 Memorial & Museum—as new exhibits and displays are developed,” he said. “The State Museum works hard to balance the unique sensitivities that exist with the World Trade Center collections with our mission to educate the visiting public in our gallery spaces.”

And the institution still has a robust outgoing loan program, allowing materials from the World Trade Center and other 9/11-related artifacts to be displayed at institutions across the U.S. and Canada. Noble is quick to reiterate that “State Museum staff coordinates closely with the organizers of these exhibits to ensure that the artifacts are handled with proper care.”