Lake Decatur's drought brings 9/11 artifact to the surface

Decatur resident John Daum was walking along the lake front on a November weekend when he found the lost treasure — a small part of a crushed file cabinet that had melded to a 13-foot-long twisted I-beam from the twin New York City World Trade Center towers that fell in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

“I thought, I can’t imagine that file cabinet went very far,” he said. “So I walked along the edge. I looked down and there it was. It didn’t take much effort to pull it out.”

Daum speculated the vandals wouldn’t want to keep the artifact in their possession for long. “I couldn’t imagine somebody who was stupid enough to vandalize something like that being willing to carry something very far,” he said. “It wasn’t surprising to me that it was right off the edge, right there by the memorial.”

The significant piece of history had been missing since vandals damaged the site two years ago. 

“I’m just so excited that the people found it,” Lauren Axe said. “The people that have handled it have taken good care of it.”

Axe was the local artifact liaison for the Nelson Park 9/11 memorial, submitting the request to the New York Port Authority that brought the 1,500 pound I-beam to the city.

The George A. Mueller Beer Co. led the campaign to bring the salvaged I-beam and the mutilated file cabinet from New York to Decatur. After years of community fundraising and volunteer efforts, the memorial was dedicated in a September 2017 ceremony at the Lake Decatur site.

Axe said the design of the memorial included efforts to protect the file cabinet piece.

“We moved it up to the top so it would be out of reach of people that would be silly enough to try and touch it,” Axe said.

Like many in the community, Axe was heartbroken when the piece was stolen.

“We didn’t realize we’d have some people who were disrespectful of the memorial and do what they did to it,” she said.

Paula Luckenbill has been taking care of the landscape around the memorial. She often looked for the artifact from the water’s edge. “Every time I’m down watering the flowers, the plants, cleaning the memorial, picking up the garbage, I’m always looking,” she said. “And I was keeping my eyes open, hoping it would resurface.”

Luckenbill spearheaded the campaign to add a flagpole near the 9/11 memorial. The flagpole was dedicated to those who have died due to 9/11 related illnesses. “Which would have been anybody who was down there,” she said. “But there’d be no need for the flagpole if the memorial wasn’t there.”

While she is tending to the area, Luckenbill often speaks with others passing by. She’s heard the “where were you when it happened” stories as well as the disdain for those who caused damage to the memorial.

“When that went missing, people were just very upset, and really outraged or angered,” she said. “The thought that somebody would climb up there, knock it down, take it, anybody with half a brain would realize that has something to do with that memorial. It shouldn’t be thrown in the lake. It shouldn’t be taken off site.”

According to Clay Gerhard, Decatur Park District executive director, the mangled piece of metal has been in the possession of the park district since Daum found it in November. “Since it was underwater for a while, it reeked,” he said about the piece of metal after it was pulled from the water.

“That’s Lake Decatur for you,” Daum said. “That’s the smell of something that’s in the lake. That’s not unusual.”

From the beginning, the park district and other members of the community speculated the artifact was in the water. “We had a sonar team down there, we had guys with grapple hooks, magnets, the fire department dive team,” Gerhard said. “Nobody could find it.”

Decatur Park Police officer Troy Kretsinger took on the responsibility of cleaning the artifact after it was retrieved from the lake. “It’s much better now than when it came out of the water,” he said.

Kretsinger used cleaning fluids that remove mold and mildew. “And I did a lot of soaking in white vinegar solutions to remove a lot of the rust,” he said. “But it was never going to be a shiny piece of metal again. At least it didn’t smell like the lake and dead fish.”

A clear coat of sealer was added to protect it from any further oxidation. “It’ll be reasonably presentable,” Kretsinger said.

Taking care of the lost artifact was important to the park police officer. “It was the right thing to do,” he said.

Kretsinger also encouraged the park district to install cameras in the area near the memorial. “The piece was removed from the memorial and thrown into the water the very evening I finally got the green light and put a trail camera down there,” he said. “Thankfully we had some images to go back to.”

Russ Bodine, director of operations with the park district, has been studying the best option for reattaching the piece to the memorial. “I wanted to bolt it instead of weld it on,” he said. “We don’t want it to come off again.”

Before the 9/11 artifacts were given to organizations and communities, regulations were applied to any piece that would go on display. The file cabinet does not have any rules about how to attach it, according to the original committee agreement. “Hopefully we anchor it and safeguard it a little bit better,” Axe said.

Extra lighting, cameras and other security measures have been added in the area of the memorial for safety and to deter vandals. Vandals have targeted the area around the memorial on at least two other occasions.

The park district and the local police haven't located the individuals who took part in the most recent vandalism and theft. Those who appreciate the memorial and understand its background are hopeful the culprits will be found.

Some feel sorry for the individuals. “A lot of the people walk past this and don’t understand the loss of life that happened, and what that event meant in the nation’s history. We’ve got to educate people more,” Gerhard said. “I wish people would just respect any memorial.”

In the 2001 attacks, nearly 3,000 people died when three airplanes were flown into New York's World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon. A fourth airplane crashed in a rural Pennsylvania field after passengers and crew attempted to retake it from terrorists who had hijacked the flight. The attacks were coordinated by the al-Qaeda terrorist network led by Osama bin Laden, who was killed in a May 2011 U.S. military operation.

“That’s a piece of history that means a lot to a lot of people, and represents the loss of a lot of lives,” Luckenbill said about the Decatur memorial.

As Daum and his wife walk along the drought stricken lake, they continue to see the debris that has accumulated along the shoreline in areas usually covered by water.

“I would encourage people to use this opportunity to clean that stuff out,” he said. “It’s just disappointing that people throw it in there to begin with. But there’s probably lots of treasures in there, if people start to look.”