Friday, February 13 2009
Beverly Eckert
February 13, 2009
by Nicholas Levis
Today brings the sad news that Beverly Eckert died in the crash of Flight 3407 on her way to Buffalo for a weekend celebration of what would have been her late husband Sean Rooney's 58th birthday. She had planned to take part in a presentation at Canisius High School of a scholarship award that she established in Sean Rooney's honor. Among the family members surviving her was her sister, Sue Borque, who told the Buffalo News that while the family had not yet received official confirmation of her sister's fate, the reality was settling in. "We know she was on that plane," Bourque said, "and now she's with [Sean]." Her husband of 34 years, Sean Rooney had been killed in the South Tower of the World Trade Center on Sept. 11th, 2001.
http://www.buffalonews.com/home/story/578061.html
Beverly Eckert devoted her life to serving others. I met this strong-willed and sensitive woman on a single occasion, in March 2004 when she welcomed me to her home in Connecticut for a few hours to conduct an interview about her advocacy work following September 11th. An insurance manager by profession, Eckert told the story of how she responded to the loss of her husband and the horror of the events. Hers was a beautiful and powerful voice and she speaks best on her own behalf:
"I guess I wish I wasn't here, because it was such a different life before September 11th. I never envisioned myself speaking to the public having to say anything other than about my own little life. I was just like everyone else, very complacent, very content. World events didn't seem to affect me, that's what I believed at the time. All that changed on Sept. 11th, and I guess I just found that I couldn't just sit back and be a victim..."
"I think any time anyone is attacked, and there's a threat and you feel threatened, there is an obvious reaction, which is to react the same way, to fight back. I saw this situation immediately as one which could degenerate into a cycle of violence. We would retaliate and there would be more killing, more death. I immediately had the feeling and hoped that this would not happen, that there would be a different reaction, that we were living at a time and a place, at least in this country, that we would have a more rational reaction than just to kill in response. And as you know, we went into Afghanistan with bombs and I did not support that. I do support stopping terrorists, but I do not think that is the most effective way to stop them ultimately. It's a short-term solution. Yes, we've contained them, but I also think in the process we've created more terrorists. I thought there would be a worldwide effort to really address the terrorism problem. But instead I think that we've polarized the world, we've isolated the United States, we've isolated ourselves from potential allies. That's been really sad for me to see, how this whole thing evolved..."
"I started a group called Voices of September 11th. This was for information purposes. I was, I think emotionally I was holding myself together keeping busy and I felt that there was a lot of information that people needed to know as they went through this process of death. It was insurance claims, it was the victims' compensation fund that was created, there was all kinds of incoming information. It was very hard to deal with. Of course there were widows and other family members in this area, and I started reaching out to them and inviting people to my house and started networking... We joined forces and became a rather large group, Voices of September 11th..."
"I joined other groups, Peaceful Tomorrows. I found them rather late in the game. I wish I had found them right away, because as I described I didn't think that retaliation and violence was the right answer to the situation. I did not link up with Peaceful Tomorrows for a good six, eight months after Sept. 11. It was really amazing to find people who thought so much like I did. David Pretori wrote a book and just reading it, it was like reading my own thoughts, it was just amazing. It was the story of Peaceful Tomorrows and how it was founded, just some really remarkable people, documenting the trip to Afghanistan which some of the others took. And we participated in the peace marches of course, before the war in Iraq started, and got a featured place in the New York City rally. That happened to be my husband's birthday, it would have been Sean's 52nd birthday on February 15th last year [2003]. So it was really meaningful to me to participate in something like that on that particular date."
http://www.voicesofsept11.org/dev/content.php?idtocitems=103
http://www.peacefultomorrows.org/
(See below for complete transcript of the interview of March 3, 2004.)
Beverly Eckert became a member of the Family Steering Committee, the group of relatives who in 2002 and 2003 spearheaded the public fight for a 9/11 commission, against resistance from the White House.
http://www.911independentcommission.org
Beverly Eckert was among a handful of Sept. 11th relatives to reject the rich settlements offered by the government in exchange for a renunciation of all legal claims against US persons or entities, such as corporations or government agencies. She participated in a number of lawsuits around Sept 11th, with the express purpose of gaining discovery and accountability about the events of the day. As the deadline for filing claims with the Victims' Compensation Fund passed in Dec. 2003, she published the following statement in USA Today: