For thirty-eight years, Bob Hanley '48, of Haworth,
N.J., worked for the Port Authority of New York and
New Jersey (PA), the agency that designed, built, and managed the World Trade Center (WTC).
He retired in 1993 after serving as the owner's representative in Europe, working out of the PA office in London. In this essay, he recalls the start of the WTC project.
On October 23, 2001, I went into New York to view the remains of the World Trade Center. I remember looking at Four World Center, on the corner of Liberty and Church Streets. It stood as a vacant, blackened, and twisted ghost of the splendid building it had been-home to the lively commodities exchanges (coffee, cacao, sugar, gold, etc.) where I had often witnessed the energy and daring of the relatively youthful traders.
These trading exchanges represented only a small sample of the extraordinary number of world-class tenants I had witnessed moving into the various buildings of the World Trade Center over the years. Many of these tenants I had personally induced to accept the offer of a unique and prestigious address that now is no longer.
The organization behind the WTC was the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Created by Congress in 1921 to promote trade and commerce in the port district, the authority's projects included the bridges and tunnels connecting New York to New Jersey; the LaGuardia, Idlewild (later JFK), and Newark airports; numerous harbor developments, from the Brooklyn waterfront to the world's first major container port at Port Elizabeth, N.J.; and the Port Authority Bus Terminal, the world's largest. The WTC began to take shape in the 1960s when a plan was finally agreed to by the governors of New York and New Jersey, the mayor of New York, the Port Authority, and the Rockefellers, who wished mightily to see the renaissance of “downtown” due to the recent relocation of their Chase bank to the area.
At first, we scoured the neighborhood for interest among the many companies involved in international trade-exporters, importers, steamship companies, freight forwarders, marine and casualty insurance companies, international banks, etc. The Port Authority law department prepared a “Memorandum of Intent” to present to those companies that appeared appropriate, indicating that if and when we were ever to build this incredible monument to world trade, they would be willing to move in if possible.
We gradually spread our efforts to include midtown Manhattan and, eventually, we spread out across the entire country with our flip charts, our slides, the whole “dog and pony show” wherever we could get bookings for a presentation. We spoke before as many generic trade and commerce groups as possible. We enlisted the help of our trade development offices and representatives in Cleveland, Chicago, Pittsburgh, San Juan, Rio, London, Zurich, Singapore, and Tokyo to search further afield and stimulate interest wherever possible.
Many of those memoranda of intent eventually became leases, producing millions of dollars in revenue to support this growing enterprise even before it was finished.
During those pre-construction days, our lawyers sought, and obtained, the Port Authority's right of “eminent domain”, giving the authority the legal right to condemn and demolish approximately 170 buildings occupying the sixteen-acre site surrounding the then-called Hudson and Manhattan Railroad Station at Cortland and Church streets. The Port Authority had agreed to take the failing commuter railroad out of bankruptcy and operate it as a part of the political quid pro quo that resulted in the demolition and removal of all those buildings to make way for the extraordinary World Trade Center complex.
The debris resulting from the demolition of so many old brick buildings, along with the earth excavated from seven stories below them, was used to enlarge Manhattan Island. The Port Authority had sunk a number of concrete caissons strategically placed in the Hudson River to retain this new landfill, which today supports both Battery Park City and the World Financial Center complex.
After the removal of the condemned buildings, and before construction could begin on what was to be the vital sub-grade support areas for all heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems as well as the enormous sub-grade parking and storage facilities, our Engineering Department created a sturdy bulwark against potential outside hydrologic as well as geologic pressures. A huge slurry wall about seventy-five feet deep and twenty-five feet wide was built surrounding the entire sixteen-acre site.
While all of this was going on, we doggedly continued our quest for commitment from foreign and domestic companies. My favorite gambit was to invite a prospect to accompany me in one of the Port Authority helicopters for a unique view of the WTC site
-and all of lower Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty-from 1,100 feet above the construction. At the appropriate dramatic point, I would request the pilot to hover and rotate in a slow circle at the approximate location of the someday-to-be Windows On The World restaurant. I invited my guest to join me in an imagined visit to the view from a corner table of the anticipated restaurant. For me, this was bliss because I knew it would be-and it was…until 9/11/01.
I would love to return to that happy time, floating blissfully and enthusing genuinely-felt convictions that what I promised would be. It was a different world, as embodied by the infectious warmth of that brilliant smile on the face of that great jazzman called Satchmo as he rendered his inspired version of “It's A Wonderful World.” Let the daydream stop there, O Lord,
I pray…let the bad go away.
September 11 was a cool, windy evening on campus, and, as the last notes of “Taps” faded, the only sound was the fluttering of 3,000 small flags that had been placed on Library Field as symbols of the lives lost on September 11, 2001. The day began with an interfaith prayer ceremony, and all day students, faculty, and staff came to the center of campus to place the red, white, and blue flags. That evening, about 1,000 people crowded into Memorial Chapel for a memorial ceremony of music and brief remarks. Afterwards, hundreds gathered to light candles. When the wind made that impossible, all joined arms as members of the Schenectady Pipe Band played “Amazing Grace” and Professor of Music Tim Olsen ended the day with “Taps,” composed during the Civil War by Gen. Daniel Butterfield of Union's Class of 1849.