Interview with Adam Parks, History 150 spring 2025, Conducted by Cyrus Bullington, March 4th 2025.

Overview

On September eleventh two thousand and one two highjacked passenger planes crashed into the iconic twin towers also known as the world trade center in the heart of New York city with minutes between. The last attack on American soil had been some 50 years earlier in WW2. Adam Parks was working at a art gallery at the time in New York city and witnessed both towers be hit only a few blocks away. He speaks about his movements around the city that day and the general aura around the city and its shifts and changes. The societal and cultural impacts from this attack have been studied and proven thousands of times in the decades after. An important theme to think about while reading this account is the uncertainty and fear that gripped the city and the nation that day a reminder to speak up and take control in times of fear.

Biography

Adam Parks was born and raised in Hagerstown Maryland. He went to William and Mary for a bachelors degree in art. After college he stayed in Virginia for a additional year before moving to upstate New York which eventually led him to following his girlfriend at the time to New York city. In New York city he worked as a art handler at a gallery in Chelsea. He was in New York during the attacks of 9/11/2001 and witnessed the fall of the towers from 10 blocks away. He now works for square space and has moved to LA but now lives back in New York city with his son. This interview was conducted by Adam Parks nephew Cyrus Bullington.

Research 

9/11 is almost seen as the big bang for modern American culture. America was for the most part a peaceful country and had been for a good 30 years before 9/11. The Vietnam, Korean and cold wars were felt in American culture but it was nothing compared to the fear that world war 2 had caused. In fact there had not been a foreign direct attack on America since the events of pearl harbor in the second world war. In fact the impact of 9/11 on the mental state of America got to a point where 71% of American adults felt depressed or were diagnosed with depression about 50% had trouble concentrating anymore and 1/3 said they had trouble sleeping. By august of 2002 half of Americans said they felt “the country had changed in a major way” a statistic that rose to 61% 10 years after. This was one of the only times in history the American public came together as a majority to unite under a common cause. About 60% of adults expressed that they trusted the federal government a statistic that had not risen that high in three decades. Along with that political parties came together and 96% of republicans and a staggering 78% of democrats believed Busch was doing a good job in his presidency a statistic that seems completely impossible in modern day.

A politician that will be talked about somewhat heavily in this interview is Rudy Giulliani who was the mayor of New York in 2001 and is regarded pretty highly for his response that morning. The mayor woke up that morning with the thought of two of the most iconic buildings in his city being hit by two  planes that day so far in the back of his mind that it probably did not even exist as a possible outcome of the morning for him or anyone but the hijackers at that. But that’s what happened and the Mayor was 2 blocks away from it he saw the dust cloud envelope the building he was in he saw what had happened on the news and then sat for a few moments. He walked out onto the street and started walking north as he went he comforted police and answered reporters. He would walk two miles pausing only at a firehouse to call news stations urging calm after which he continued walking until he got to a press conference in which he showed a calmness and certainty that seemed next to impossible considering the events that had just unfolded. In comparison to president Busch’s reaction to the news this was night and day Bush was frozen and shaken Giulliani was calm and collected truly a benchmark for any leader looking to prepare for the possibility of any disaster.

 

 

Transcription

Cyrus – Okay, all right, well, first question is, what’s your name and just a little bit about yourself?

 

Adam – Adam parks, I live in New York City. I moved here in 2000 briefly moved to LA a few years ago, and just moved back last year, and I work at Squarespace.

 

Cyrus – Cool so yeah, how did you end up in New York?

 

Adam – The woman I was dating moved down here to go back to school, and I moved with her. I never thought I would move to New York. Yeah, I was always like, I’ll never live in a big city. I don’t want to do that. And then I moved out here, and I kind of hated it for the first year or two, and then something clicked. And then I never wanted to live anywhere else.

 

Cyrus – What did you hate about it at first?

 

Adam – Um, it was just, it’s really hard. Like, you gotta, like, you gotta, like, treat. You gotta learn how to treat your neighborhood as your city, because your neighborhood kind of has everything you need. So if you’re, like, trying to think of like New York as this whole thing that you need to, like, make your way around and like, figure out, like, that’s not gonna happen. So you kind of gotta, like, make your own little, little town inside of big city.

 

Cyrus – Um, how old were you like at the time when you moved?

 

Adam – 25 when I moved? Okay, what was I doing? Was Yeah, right question.

 

Cyrus  – Were you in Squarespace yet? Or were you?

 

Adam – No ,I so I studied art in school. I was still an artist slash waiter, right? My first job down here was as art handler at a Art Gallery in Chelsea.

 

Cyrus – Okay, and were you living like around Chelsea, or were you,

 

Adam – No ,I was living in Clinton Hill, it’s neighborhood in Brooklyn, before , yeah, and then I would like go to the galleries in Chelsea.

 

Cyrus – So, did you go to graduate school or, what’d you do between college
and New York?

 

Adam – I moved up to Saratoga, Springs, New York, and lived with some friends for a year, and then I moved down to, well, actually, I think I stayed, like an extra year in Williamsburg, Virginia, okay, where I went to school and then moved up to Saratoga for a year, and then I moved on to New York.

 

Cyrus – Okay um so what was the morning of those attacks like for you?

 

Adam – It was surreal, like it didn’t make any sense. So I remember, like, it’s a little foggy, but I think what happened is my mom called and said, you know, a plane just hit the World Trade Center. So I was thinking, like, some, like, small, two person plane and, like, just this minor accident. So we turned on the TV and, like, as we’re watching the report of, like, this plane that hit the tower, we see on the TV, like the second plane hit, we’re like, oh, this is bizarre. Like, it made no sense, yeah, so we saw that happen, and then, for whatever reason, we were like, Okay, well, time to go to work. Like, it just didn’t seem like, like New York, like, stuff happens and everybody just goes on with their days. We’re like, All right, well, they’ll figure it out. So we got on the train. I was at the time, I was working at the art directors Club, which is, it’s not too far from Chelsea. It was on, like 29th and sixth, so, and we lived in Clinton Hill on the c train. We got on the c train, which goes directly under the World Trade Center, like it stops at the World Trade Center. So we got on the train. The train was still running. We, like, rode under the World Trade Center. I remember it stopping at the World Trade Center. I might be making that part up, um, like, just made us normal stop. Like, this was before, like, anybody really know what was happening? They were just trying to get people down.

 

Cyrus – Was this, like, like, sorry, was this like, like, 30 minutes after the attacks, or like an hour after the attacks.

 

Adam – It was probably about, it was less than an hour after the second okay, by the time we were on the train.

 

Cyrus – So you went under the towers, yeah, almost an hour after the second plane wow, yeah, okay.

 

Adam – Which is absolutely insane. I remember, like the train stopping with doors opening and people getting on and off. I don’t know if I just knew that. Made that part up, because it seems like impossible, but I remember that happening.

 

Cyrus – Yeah I mean, whoever got off probably did not have a good rest of their day.

 

Adam – Yeah. So my girlfriend at the time and I, we ended up, like, just going to my office and, like, hanging out there with the other people I worked with that were there, and we’re all just like, they’re like, what is happening? Like, This is insane. Like, just trying to read news reports, like, all trying to figure out, like, what we should do. We all just kind of hunker down there for a little bit.

 

Cyrus – Um, so how far was your office from the, you know, region of the attack?

 

Adam – So it was on 29th street, you like, you could probably it was probably trying to do some math, less than two miles, I would say, okay, yeah,

 

Cyrus – What were your observations, did you go out into the city, like, you know, hours after the attack, or your observations of the city, you know, the hours after?

 

Adam – So we spent a few hours, like, everybody just kind of like talking through it, and like trying to take care of each other at the office and figuring out, like, how everybody was going to get home, what everybody’s going to do. And then at one point I like, I went outside to look, because you could see the World Trade Centers. Like, if you stand on sixth Avenue, you could see them from my office. Yeah. So I went out to, like, kind of see what was going on. I was standing like, in the middle of Sixth Avenue, looking down, and at that point, like, the first tower started to fall. So I saw the first tower, like, pancake down, like, from the middle of Sixth Avenue. And at that point I was like, All right, like we’re getting out of here, like we’re going somewhere. Like, this feels too close. So I went back in and, like, everybody, I guess, saw it on TV or heard it or whatever at the same time. And I, you know, I said to my girlfriend, like it’s time to go, like we got to get out of here. And everybody was like, trying to make a plan for how they’re going to get home, what they were going to do. My girlfriend’s grandmother lived on the Upper East Side on 86 and Lex, which is far like you would never walk it normally. But we decided that we were just going to walk up to her place. We didn’t really know what else to do, because we definitely didn’t want to walk downtown. So we just start walking like we had to walk past, like, through past Times Square, past Port Authority, and like, there’s just people walking like, people walking away from downtown, like, just groups of people, and at one point, like, I think it was near Port Authority or Madison Square Garden, like, somebody yelled bomb or heard a noise and like, everybody just started running. Like, my girlfriend lost one of her shoes, like, we just, like, freaked out and booked it. Ran for a couple blocks. It wasn’t a bomb. Like, I don’t know what happened, but we eventually made it up to her grandmother’s house, it was probably like a couple hours of walking, I would guess. And then we hung out there with her for a little bit, and I had a dog. I wanted to get home with my dog. Let’s worry about my dog. So later in the afternoon, we ended up walking a little bit downtown and over the Queensboro Bridge, I think, into queens and then from there, we were able to get a taxi. We took a taxi back to our apartment.

 

Cyrus – So in most of my research, and in most of my understanding of you know what happened that day when the towers collapsed, almost the entire city was kind of covered in a cloud of, like, smog and debris, yeah, like, did it all effect you on that hour walk, or.

 

Adam – No, it didn’t make it up that high. Like, I think that was pretty confined. Like, I don’t think anything made it up past, like, Fourth Street. Like, yeah, but if you were there when it collapsed, like, you were just covered in dust, right? And, like, a lot of those people, like, ended up with, like, bad news, with the, like, cancer and like, all kinds of stuff.

 

Cyrus – This is kind of redundant question. You just said, but you know, what did you notice in the hours after the attacks? Kind of just answered that.

 

Adam – Just like everybody, everybody obviously on edge, like nobody knew what was going to happen, I felt like there was a lot of like, everybody looking to somebody, like, to take charge. I remember at the time, like, Giuliani [Mayor of New York at the time], like, it’s like, you know, he, he was able to, like, kind of get things under control and, like, project this image of, like, okay, it’s gonna be okay, like, we’re gonna get through this. Unfortunately, he turned into whatever he is now, but at the time, I remember being like, feeling like, comforted by that, that at least somebody was like, in charge and confident that they were gonna be able to, like, figure this out. It was like, it was just surreal. Like, I said, like, it was surreal and scary. And like, I didn’t know if we, like, should just get our car and leave the city. I didn’t know, like, if we should go, like, try to help rescue people. Like, I really, I had no idea what we’re doing with the rest of the day.

 

Cyrus – Yeah, and like you mentioned Giuliani, but, um, what were, what were people’s, like, kind of general opinion of Busch [President at the time] at the time, like, just, you know, after the attacks, what were they saying?  If anything at all.

 

Adam – Nobody was really talking about him. Like, I think that, like, the whole scene. Mean, when he’s in the library reading to the kids, like, I don’t think, don’t know about that until the next day or so. I think, like, for me personally, I was like, it evoked such a like, strong fear response that I was just like, I just want somebody to, like, tell me everything’s okay. And it didn’t really, like, matter who it was or what they were doing. Like, I think, like, at the time, people like, wanted the mayor, they wanted the governor, they wanted the president to, like, take charge. And then it wasn’t until later that people were like, oh, not like that.

 

Cyrus -Did you know that the Pentagon got hit that day? Or did you learn that later?

 

Adam – I think, I think I remember, because I’m sure we were watching TV, yeah, when we got back to the apartment. So, yeah, I think we knew about that and the flight that got down as well. Yeah. Like, I remember thinking, like, something even bigger must be coming because, like it felt like a precursor, like the first phase and like some big attack, like I was, like, they wouldn’t do anything this insane, right, unless they were about to, like, invade or something crazy.

 

Cyrus – So you went to her grandmother’s place, yeah, and then you walked back to your place?

 

Adam – We walked across the Queensborough bridge into queens, and then we’re able to get a
taxi.

 

Cyrus – Okay, so you walk to Queens, got a taxi back to your place and what do you I don’t know if you remember, but around what time was when you got, like, all the way back.

 

Adam – It was definitely, like, late afternoon or early evening.

 

Cyrus  – Yeah, what’d you do for the rest of the day?

 

Adam – I think, I mean, I just kind of like freaked out. Was like, I really had this, like, impending sense of doom, like something, something else is gonna happen.

 

Cyrus – Yeah, so how were you able to sleep that night? I know I wouldn’t have probably been able to sleep.

 

Adam – Yeah, probably just exhaustion, like we walked like 10 miles or something like, just, like the the fear and anxiety and like the cortisol in your body.

 

Cyrus  – So what were the days like after that. You know the following, what it happened on a, like, a Monday, right?

 

Adam – That sounds right. I don’t remember, like, I didn’t go back to work for a little bit. I did, I think, like the next day or the day after that. I did end up going to the Jada Center, which is like, this big convention center on the West Side Highway, because they were, like, organizing volunteers. So I went there to see, but they, like, they were turning people away at the time. So I kind of wanted to see, like, you know, what can I do? Just like, to kind of feel some sense of control. And then I think, like, most people definitely didn’t work the rest of the week. But like, like, I said, like, New York’s kind of weird, and that, like, these huge things happen. And like, like, part of living here is, like, going about your daily life, even though insane stuff is happening around you all the time, right? Yeah. So I remember, like, it wasn’t that long until, like, I was back at work, and people were just like, you know, trying to to go on with their lives.

 

Cyrus – So you would say that it took, like, you know, not even a whole week, a whole week, for the city to reach, you know, kind of a normality again, if it reached a normality ever?

 

Adam – To start to get people, to start to try to go back to go back to routines. Like, like, you know, there was like, National Guard or, like, I can’t remember who was there, but there was people everywhere, like, you couldn’t go anywhere near downtown, like, like, all the streets were blocked off, like, everything was covered in dust. So it wasn’t normal in any way. But people were still, like, trying to get back to their day to day life as much as they could.

 

Cyrus –  Bonus question, what were, what was the, what was the general consensus in New York at the time about America’s response to the attacks? If you were able to gage that, I don’t know if that’s, that’s, that’s something you can find.

 

Adam – Are you talking about, like, the immediate response, or, like, Desert Storm[invasion of iraq directly after 9/11]?

 

Cyrus – Yea Desert Storm.

 

Oh, I remember, like, everybody was like, what are you talking about? Like, why are you going to Iraq? Like, at that point, like, that was, that was several months, I can’t even remember, yeah, but at that point, people were like, no. Like, clearly, like, this was not Iraq. Like, what are you talking about? Like, you just, like, are trying to, like, force your agenda onto this situation. It felt very like. At that point, I felt very misattuned to, like, what people wanted and needed and what was actually happening.

 

Cyrus – Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, well, that’s all my written questions. I don’t know if you have any bonus details to share. You seem to have a pretty good story there. So, yeah.

 

Adam  – It was, it was crazy, like, I, I have a hard time believing that I was, like, under the World Trade Center. Like, it seems like I couldn’t have happened, but it really was, like, it was just so far out of like, the realm of possibility, yeah, something like this happening that I don’t, yeah, I don’t have any like, big wisdom. Like, always wear comfortable shoes. You can run away anytime you need to. I mean, not to get like too doom and gloom, but you know, like, there’s a little bit of that, like feeling going on now with, like, what’s happening in the world, and, like, the chaos that is, like, being caused by people. So it does, like, I’m feeling similar things now to that moment where, like, oh, nobody’s in charge, like, and everything could fall apart. Yeah. So in a sense, like, it helps to remember, like, how I felt in like, those few days after 911 feeling like, oh, this is, like, the beginning of the end. And then it clearly wasn’t. So it does. I can’t remember this thing that I, like, I lived through and happened to me, and we got through it, even though it was horrible, and, like, some terrible things happened, but like that, like the constant sense of, like anxiety is around now in a very similar way.

 

Cyrus – Little off topic of the anxiety, but um, what was, what was the sound like when it happened, like when it collapsed and then when it hit? If there was, if you could hear it at all,

 

Adam  – I couldn’t hear it when it hit because you’re in below. Don’t remember much of a sound when it collapsed. But I also just remember, like, it was kind of like an out of body experience, yeah, because it was so, like, the way it collapsed was so weird, just like floor by floor, like it would just pause at every floor and then the next one would fall.

 

Cyrus – Wow. Yeah, that sounds insane to watch.

 

Adam – Well, it was, it was crazy. It was insane. Yeah, wow.

 

Cyrus – I can’t even like picture that really.

 

Adam –  Yeah, and, I mean, they were just so big, like, the buildings were just insane,

 

Cyrus – Yeah, I mean, that’s probably the end of the interview, yeah, thank you.

 

Adam – Yeah, anytime, yeah. Thanks for asking.

 

Interview Process

This interview was conducted on Tuesday March 4th over zoom. I contacted my uncle a couple weeks before to work out date and timing. Soon after I had come up with questions so those were emailed to him along with the zoom invite. After the interview I asked my uncle if there was anything in particular I should research in his opinion and he pointed out how good Giuliani was during this time so that was included in my research.

Transcription Process 

I used otter.ai to transcribe this interview. I listened to the audio and removed some unneeded bits at the end and beginning and used audacity to up the quality a bit. Otter.ai did a great job of getting the transcription quick but there were a good number of errors in spelling and who it thought was talking which was pretty tedious to edit out.

Bibliography

Hartig, Hannah. “Two Decades Later, the Enduring Legacy of 9/11.” Pew Research Center, Pew Research Center, 2 Sept. 2021, www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/09/02/two-decades-later-the-enduring-legacy-of-9-11/. (peer reviewed)