Remembering September 11, 2001

by Dean Wiltse

In the midst of what we thought were the worst business climate

conditions during the summer of 2001, the world was reminded

how precious life can be. Most people arrived at our Wilton offices

between 8 A.M. and 9 A.M. each day. Wilton is a bedroom com-

munity where most residences commute into New York City each

day. Our largest investor was on 5th Ave and 49th Street and most of

their employees lived in the city.

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Our modern office design had a TV screen in the lobby and another

in the kitchen usually tuned to a news channel. Bob Bies, Jonathan Flatow,

and I each had TVs in our offices and also usually tuned to news. We never

sat and watched them; they were mostly on for the atmosphere. On

that Tuesday morning I remember hearing Jonathan scream from his

office, pretty far away from mine, “Oh my God, we are under attack.”

Mind you, at the moment the first plane flew into the twin towers

no one was reporting an attack. It was merely Jonathan’s immediate

reaction, which turned out to be amazingly correct. Everyone ran out

of their offices and went to one of the TVs. Several of us ended up in

Bob’s office to watch the events unfold. The reporting was very un-

certain as to what was happening as time went on. At 8:46:40: Flight

11 crashes into the north face of the North Tower (1 WTC) of the

World Trade Center, between floors 93 and 99. The aircraft enters

the tower intact. Remembering that day it seemed like a much longer

?time had passed from when Tower 2 was hit, but reports say that

9:03:00: Flight 175 crashes into the south face of the South Tower (2 WTC)

of the World Trade Center, between floors 77 and 85. Parts of the plane,

including the starboard engine, leave the building from its east and north

sides, falling to the ground six blocks away. The entire office was fixated on

the TV screens and we all watched in horror together as the second plane

hit.

Everyone in the office was now scrambling to get to a phone. The second

plane and the reports of more hijackings created a sense of panic to reach

their loved ones. No one knew what would happen next. I remember calling

my ex-wife who lived in the Boston area with my son. It wasn’t common

knowledge yet that American Flight 11 and United Flight 175 both

departed from Boston Logan airport. My ex-brother-in-law was a

Massachusetts State Trooper stationed at Logan. My ex-wife was on

the way to a dentist appointment with my son and made the decision

to stop and turn around to get home as she heard the frightening

news on the radio.

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Once I made contact and knew they were safe I went back over to

Bob’s office and the kitchen to watch the events unfold for the day.

We told everyone to feel free to head home to be with their loved

ones, though there were many people who had still not heard from

their inner circles to learn if their loved ones were safe. We were all in

a state of shock and continued to be glued to TVs wherever we spent

the night. The next morning Greg Pierson came into my office. Greg is a

special person to everyone who knows him. I got to know Greg because

of his warm personality and his IT position with the company.

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Greg was originally hired by Hugh Davis, co-founder of Greenfield Online.

Greg was bartending at the Black Duck in Westport, Connecticut.

Hugh lived in Westport and frequented “the Duck.” As Greenfield started to

grow, Hugh was always on the lookout for good people he could trust,

regardless of experience. Greg was “trainable” and certainly had the right

attitude about everything. A hard worker, helpful to everyone and anyone,

and always with a positive attitude. When I joined, the company had

been through multiple layoffs, the business climate was terrible,

people were nervous about everything and Greg had a way of putting a

smile on your face and making things seem better. As the “IT guy” he is the

one that gave me my computer and got me connected, so to speak. I asked

him to get me a Blackberry and to provide one to each of the management

team. His response was that the company had some other “pagers” and

that it wasn’t a good idea for me to spend money on Blackberrys when we

already had perfectly useful pagers. That was Greg. I tried to explain the

difference. The next day he came to my office with a pager. I really enjoyed

his attitude and boldness with his new CEO, but did insist on getting a

Blackberry. Over the course of my first few months at the company Greg

and I developed a special relationship. He was my ears to the ground so to

speak. He would tell me things like, “You know, Dean, you should walk

around the office more. The team needs to get to know you like I have.”

The day after September 11, Greg walked into my office and said

“Dean, we have all these computers in good working condition from

the layoffs sitting in a room not being used. Why don’t we donate

them to the city and the rescuers? They could probably use them.”

That was Greg. My initial reaction was, Hey, we’re a company that

has been losing tons of money, so we can’t make donations. But be-

fore he could object to a response like that, I caught myself and

realized that this person is genuinely a good man. This is a great idea.

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Greg and a few others that worked with him loaded his van with over

20 computers and set off for a city in fear and police stopped all vans

headed into the city. He made it in. Delivered them and set them all

up so the rescue team had 20 additional working computers.

I will never forget that day or those following. Our employees had

been through a great deal personally, prior to September 11, 2001.

Now, in addition to experiencing the tragedies of living in one of the

worst economic times, they survived the events of that day. We were

focused on trying to save the business before 9/11, thinking almost

24/7 about how the impact of failure could mean devastation to our

families when, when out of nowhere we learned a more valuable les-

son about life. People really came together and were doing whatever

they could to be supportive of the families directly impacted. Wilton

lost four men that day. It seemed like everyone knew someone that

had a direct loss.

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23 years later, we will never forget that nearly 3000 people were killed

on September 11, 2001 and their families that have suffered since.