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By Emily Clott, Class of 2012

Every single one of us remembers where we were and what we were doing when hijacked planes deliberately flew into the Pentagon and the World Trade Center’s twin towers on that bright September morning twenty years ago. We did not know how, but we knew that our lives would never be the same.

In the immediate aftermath of the attack Jane Buckwalter, then Docent Council President, wrote in her monthly Docent News column: “For those of us who take such joy in the built environment, it has been difficult these past few weeks to know exactly how to talk about skyscrapers, particularly Sears Tower, the Hancock Building, and Aon Center. Visitors may have questions regarding structural elements we have not considered or previously included in our tours. Beyond the strictly factual information we provide, we have often related our pride in having these “tallest” buildings in our city. Although we may still feel that pride, it now seems a mixed blessing, and perhaps not quite appropriate to mention it.”

Architecture, engineering, tourism, aviation, and our organization changed forever that day. Jen Masengarb, now Executive Director of AIA Chicago, recalled in a phone interview that she was a newbie at CAF when the attacks took place. She remembers that tourism came to a complete halt overnight. The public had never imagined how something so big or seemingly permanent as the World Trade Center towers could come down in an instant. Those who did travel did not want to look up at or think about tall buildings. This was disastrous for our organization that was focused on getting visitors to look up and appreciate the wonder of tall buildings.

A major staff layoff occurred in November, 2001. Jen recalled that CAF had recently expanded into new office space and into Cityspace in the Railway Exchange Building. The timing of this expansion was unfortunate in the light of the 9/11 attacks. CAF had to reduce the number of Loop tours and offer more tours in neighborhoods. When we re-emerged from the immediate aftermath of the attacks, both docents and tourees showed an increased interest in how buildings stand up. CAF sponsored evening lectures and lunchtime talks that identified similarities and differences between major Chicago skyscrapers and the World Trade Center.

Jen also noted that the freedom to go in and out of buildings during tours ended with the attacks, and many buildings took security measures, such as the bollards on the Federal Center Plaza, to prevent the possibility of truck bombs.

In his book Terror and Wonder: Architecture in a Tumultuous Age, Blair Kamin, former Chicago Tribune architecture critic, explains that the initial post-9/11 conviction that the tall building would henceforth be a liability proved untrue, and that “…tall buildings…proved far more resilient than the doomsayers had forecast.” He describes the globalization of the skyscraper, how “US firms exported their expertise in commercial architecture, particularly the skyscraper, to booming countries like China or city-states like Dubai.” Kamin opines that the true antidote to 9/11 here in Chicago was the opening of Millennium Park, whose Crown Fountain twin towers exemplify the kind of soul- nourishing sense of community, play, and shared experience that the terrorists could not destroy.

Today docents learn about structure: load bearing brick walls vs. steel frame vs. reinforced and post-tension concrete. Post 9/11 skyscraper designs feature sturdy concrete wrapped around steel members, hugely improving upon the World Trade Center’s sheetrock over steel frame that couldn’t withstand the force of the planes crashing or the jet-fuel inferno that melted the steel before evacuation was complete.

Architects and engineers now design wider staircases to aid egress of inhabitants and ingress of fire crews as well as redundant electrical and water systems in contrast to the WTC’s failed water and electrical systems that doomed the firefighters trying to contain the blaze. We’re now accustomed to enhanced security in downtown buildings and airports. Fear was supplanted by defiance and a renewed celebration of the genius that can create buildings that seem to float in the sky.

Today we face another kind of terror, this time an invisible enemy in the form of a virus. Once again, we hesitate to gather. CAC struggles with a sudden and precipitous drop in tourism just after a time of expansion and growth. Staff has been cut, Center hours and tours reduced. Our ability to visit buildings on our tours is limited. We aren’t sure what the “new normal” will look like after a year and a half of adjusting to the reality of Covid-19. Yet we expect that CAC, our city, our nation, and our world will rebound, just as it did after that tragic day twenty years ago.

Thanks to Jen Masengarb, Jane Buckwalter, Donna Gabanski, and Adam Rubin for their help with this piece.

Editor’s note: After 9/11, some thought that the skyscraper era was effectively over. CLICK HERE  to read the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat’s report: “The Global Impact of 9/11 on Tall Buildings. “