Anita McBride Former Chief of Staff to First Lady Laura Bush :
If you are 18 years old or older, you can remember September 11, 2001, and answer the one question everyone is asking today, “where were you?"
I remember it was going to be a relatively quiet day at work in the White House. The president was out of town, and the first lady was heading up to the Hill. Driving in that morning, I took note of the fact that the weather was spectacular - one of those rare end of summer sunny days with a cloudless blue sky and crisp, cool air.
This was my third time working in the White House over a 20 year period for three different Presidents, but within an hour of arriving there that day, it was the first time I ever had been commanded to lead an evacuation of the building I always believed was the safest place you could work.
Among the many memories I have of that day, are vivid pictures in my mind of the Secret Service with drawn weapons in the White House West Wing commanding me to go through West Wing offices and tell everyone to “get out” and stay put in the windowless senior staff dining room called the White House Mess. We knew the World Trade Center towers were hit but we knew little else. It wasn’t long before new commands from the agents turned more urgent. “Run and get out of here”, are words you never expect to hear when you work at the White House.
Both the southwest and northwest gates of West Executive Avenue were flung open and staff from the West Wing and the Eisenhower Executive Office Building ran in both directions out of the complex.
Run. That was the evacuation plan.
Working at the White House is great training and instincts to think clearly and act, kick in quickly. I remember looking around in Lafayette Park and seeing several very senior White House staff as well as some very new-to-Washington young staffers standing there not knowing what to do. I made a quick call to my husband, telling him I was on my way to his office, and I gathered those around me and led them two blocks to the Daimler Chrysler building on 14th and H Streets, NW.
Within a very short time, 72 members of the White House gathered, worked, and watched the events unfold in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania in that downtown D.C. office. It was the largest number of White House staff gathered in a single location. I made another quick call to the White House Situation Room and alerted officials to who was with us. We soon made arrangements for a few senior staff to get back to the White House.
For the rest of us who stayed together that day, the atmosphere was subdued, yet professional, and we quickly set up operations in offices, conference rooms and cubicles.
The quietest offices were set aside for the president’s speechwriters and it was there that they began to draft the remarks that the president would deliver that night.
The Secret Service locked down the building and only those with White House passes were able to gain access. The agents came to brief us periodically on what was going on in Washington and elsewhere.
When word came that the president was headed back to the White House, the speechwriters headed there to join him, and other staff began to go home. I went through every office, cubicle and conference room gathering any papers, notes, sign-in sheets and office diagrams knowing all of this were presidential records that would be necessary to turn over for archiving.
Walking back to the White House to get my car, I was eager to get home and see my children, ages one and four. Throughout the day it weighed on me that my husband and I were in the same place and what would happen to them if something happened to us?
Now 11 and 14, they don’t have the vivid memories we have of September 11, 2011, but they have learned about 9/11 stories of bravery. They have heard us talk about tough and unpopular choices made by President Bush and other leaders to keep the country safe. They have seen pictures of my and my husband’s several trips to Afghanistan and they have volunteered at events for wounded warriors and their families.
As parents we know their childhood is defined by circumstances so different than our own. On September 11, 2011, we hope and pray our children’s generation, and those that follow, will not have another event in their lifetime so horrific as that day 10 years ago, and we hope that they never have to answer the question “where were you?”