11/09/2026
One thing that will always stay with me about 9/11 is how, amid so much darkness, there were also countless stories of human kindness that showed what New York and its people are supposed to represent.
One of those stories came from Broadway, when theatre equipment normally used to bring shows to life suddenly found a much more important purpose on the night of September 11, 2001.
New York City’s Department of Design and Construction needed powerful lights to illuminate the rescue site so crews could continue working through the darkness, but suitable light towers were difficult to find.
That’s when someone had an idea: call Broadway, and within hours the Belasco Theatre had sent its own stage lights downtown to help rescue workers see through the night.
It’s a small detail compared with the scale of everything that happened that day, but stories like this remain incredibly moving because they remind us of the kindness people can show each other during the hardest moments.
