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CNN Live At Daybreak
America's New War: The Nation's Recovery
Aired September 21, 2001 - 08:52 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Working with a team of 30 reporters in New York and sifting through a sea of more than 20,000 images, "People" magazine has assembled a special edition called "The Nation's Recovery."
Joining me now to talk about that title, and the magazine's content, is assistant managing editor Rob Howe.
Nice to see you.
ROB HOWE, ASST. MANAGING EDITOR, PEOPLE MAGAZINE: Thanks for having me.
ZAHN: Let's get one thing out of the way here, "People" magazine of course owned by CNN's parent company, AOL Time Warner.
All right. Let's get on to what you tried to accomplish with this issue. I've just been paging through it, there are some stunning images in here. How did you choose these images?
HOWE: We are very proud of this issue. We did the last two issues, every single page was devoted to this story because it was so important. The first one was really about the event itself. This one is special because it's about the recovery.
It's about people finding the spirit and the will to go on. We had one woman tell us, we've seen the evil that humanity can do, now we're seeing the good. And we wanted to document that both in the stories and the images.
ZAHN: There is so much pressure in the zone right now, with rescue workers and the volunteers who've come in the area to help out. How did you find these people to talk?
HOWE: Well, we had people everywhere. We probably looked at 300, maybe 400 possible stories to choose 40 or 50 that were particularly good. We were looking for heroes, and that's not just firemen but regular people.
ZAHN: They were not hard to find, were they?
HOWE: The firemen or --
ZAHN: The heroes. HOWE: The heroes. There's so many heroes in so many places. You look at somebody like Peter Ganci, he's the fire chief, incredibly selfless guy. You ask him, what do you do for a living? He would say, I'm a fireman, he would not say I'm the chief of the fire department.
We had a story where a woman was trapped, wheelchair bound woman since youth, trapped on the 68th floor. And two men, two strangers, carry her down. They get to the fifth floor which is flooded, it's dark, there are no light, there's smoke, you can't see, and they found a way out.
So we had the everyday hero, and there are plenty of them.
ZAHN: How did you track them down?
HOWE: Well it's a matter of being on the scene and making a lot of calls. And of course a lot of people in New York are connected with the people who were in the tragedy, sadly. But it's just a matter of combing through all the possibilities.
We had some great stories too of hope. We had somebody who was on a plane to go see his daughter's wedding. He died on that plane, but the family felt it was important to go on. They had the wedding on Friday. The daughter said it was important to show that they can't stop us.
ZAHN: I guess by now those of us who have been covering this story, and those of you watching this, are not surprised by the level of strength that you have seen in these people you've interviewed.
Was there anything that surprised you as you started going through these dozens and dozens of stories, where you see this theme repeated again and again?
HOWE: Surprise, I'm not so sure, but inspired, impressed. The amazing strength and will of these people. There is one story, three elementary schoolkids who had won an award, they were going to the west coast for a science fair. They all died on that plane. And the town pulled together, the school pulled together.
But amazingly, the parents of one of the kids started a fund, not to help themselves but to help the school. Their fund will raise money for computers for the school, so other elementary schoolkids can learn science. That is just amazing and impressive to me.
ZAHN: Yes, you do see such a sense of selflessness and a total lack of selfishness.
Have you ever seen this in all of your years of being in this business surrounding a disaster? Clearly, there's never been a disaster of this magnitude. But you've certainly gone into areas hit hard by earthquakes and tornadoes.
HOWE: I think you are right. I am not sure we've seen anything that is really like this before. The incredible loss, it's not just property loss, of course the human loss, the loss of confidence. There is fear, there is anxiety around. But we've learned an incredible lesson here, we learned also we have a great capacity for good, and that can't be emphasized enough.
ZAHN: I guess one thing, Rob, that will continue to amaze me is how the firefighters reacted to what they're enduring right now. Like you said, when you talked to the fire chief, they just consider it a part of their job.
I know they are grateful for America's response, and their gratitude for what they do, but they never want to seem to look at themselves as heroes.
HOWE: Well you know, this is their job, to go into dangerous situations, and we kind of assume that a lot of the time. We don't think about it. But I think we realize it now, we realize how serious it is and how brave they truly are to face a burning building, to face a collapsed building. I don't know how they do it. Our deepest admiration goes out to them.
ZAHN: Well Rob Howe, it's good of you to join us.
HOWE: My pleasure.
ZAHN: Perhaps this will give America a slight pause, and maybe they'll be able to look at some of the more positive aspects of what has come out of this horrible, horrible tragedy.
HOWE: I hope so.
ZAHN: Appreciate your time.
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