Timed to the 25th Anniversary of 9/11, Collection is Available Remotely for the First Time
September 11, 2026 - The Library of Congress has launched an online collection of nearly 500 first-hand accounts from 9/11 responders to mark the 25th anniversary of the World Trade Center attack.
Housed in the American Folklife Center, the collection includes 484 full-length video interviews conducted between April 2010 and September 2024, along with their corresponding transcripts, which document what responders witnessed, why they responded, what they endured, and how the experience affected their health, families and lives in the years that followed. The collection finding aid [https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.afc/eadafc.af005002 contains a full inventory of the collection.
Taken together, the interviews preserve not only the memories of a historic event, but the testimony of witnesses whose lives became part of it continuing history. Making them available through the Library of Congress ensures that their testimony becomes part of the nation’s permanent memory.
The interviews are part of a project begun by Benjamin Luft, a physician at Stony Brook Medicine in New York, who treated responders in the years after the attacks.
“I began these interviews because I realized that my patients were not simply people who had become ill after 9/11; they were witnesses to history,” said Luft, director of the Stony Brook WTC Wellness Program. “They had seen extraordinary courage, loss, compassion and sacrifice, and they were living with the consequences years later. We wanted to preserve their accounts in their own voices, before time inevitably changed what the nation remembered. Twenty five years later, these interviews allow them to speak directly to future generations.”
Researchers and the public can search the detailed online archive by responder names, hometowns, and occupations. The site also features five thematic compilations of excerpts from multiple interviews, exploring “the day America was attacked,” “rescue, recovery and cleanup,” “development of diseases and loss,” “resiliency” and “family member perspectives,” as well as 42 additional compilations drawn from the full-length videos.
This unique collection comes to the Library as the nation marks 25 years since the attacks, expanding the American Folklife Center’s documentation of Sept. 11 and ensuring responders' experiences remain available to future generations.
“It is our responsibility and privilege to safeguard this history to help educate people about the lives of 9/11 responders,” said Nicole Saylor, director of the American Folklife Center. “Making these in-depth interviews available worldwide is a major milestone not only in our collection stewardship efforts but also in ensuring that the stories, lives, and collective memory of 9/11 responders remain accessible around the world.”
Among the hundreds of interviewees in the collection:
Carol Paukner, NYPD transit officer – Paukner helped evacuate people from the World Trade Center and survived the collapse of the South Tower, suffering injuries that eventually forced her retirement. She later received the NYPD Medal of Valor for her actions.
Tyree Bacon, senior court officer and EMT: Bacon rescued a severely burned woman from the South Tower and was trapped with her below street level when the building collapsed. He dragged her through the rubble until they were rescued; three colleagues who entered the complex with him died.
Ronald King, construction supervisor: An immigrant from Guyana, King volunteered at Ground Zero, securing donated equipment and working in the bucket brigade for months. He reflects on the experience with gratitude to the United States and a belief in the strength and compassion of its people.
Kayla Coughlin, daughter of an NYPD officer: Six years old when her father was killed on 9/11, Coughlin recounts growing up with that loss, finding healing among other children of victims and eventually pursuing a career in storytelling and documentary production.
Robert Weisberg, volunteer firefighter: Weisberg describes nine months of work at Ground Zero and his years-long struggle with PTSD afterward. He later turned toward recovery and advocacy, hiking more than 1,850 miles of the Appalachian Trail while raising awareness of mental-health challenges among first responders and veterans.
The American Folklife Center is also home to other collections of personal narratives about the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, including the “September 11, 2001, Documentary Project,” which includes sound and video recordings, hundreds of photographs and drawings, news clippings, written narratives, e-mails, and artifacts. See related resources for additional collections of note across the Library.
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Source: Library of Congress
