09/11/2026
🇺🇸 An actual piece of history directly from Ground Zero, standing proud in the heart of Alliance ❤️🇺🇸
As we remember September 11, 2001, we are fortunate to have a powerful and truly unique place of remembrance right here in Silver Park.
The story of the Alliance 9/11 Memorial began years before its dedication. What started as a community effort in 2007 eventually brought two actual pieces of aluminum “skin” from the World Trade Center home to Alliance. John Gross and former Alliance Mayor Toni Middleton traveled to New York City to retrieve the pieces from Hangar 17 at Kennedy Airport, where artifacts recovered from Ground Zero were being stored.
From there, our community helped turn those pieces of history into something that generations could see, touch and remember.
Students from the University of Mount Union’s art department designed the memorial that now stands in Silver Park. Dedicated on September 11, 2014, the finished structure stands approximately 20 feet tall and weighs 1,120 pounds.
Its design is filled with meaning.
The two pieces recovered from the World Trade Center are positioned in the same orientation to one another as the Twin Towers once stood — one north and one south. Fabricated steel with perforations represents the floors of the towers, while the large stones surrounding the memorial symbolize the rubble left behind after their collapse.
Perhaps most remarkable, Alliance’s memorial is believed to be the only 9/11 memorial in the country created using aluminum debris from the World Trade Center.
It is more than a monument.
It is a piece of American history entrusted to our community.
It is a place to remember the nearly 3,000 lives lost at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. It is a place to honor the first responders who ran toward danger, the families whose lives were forever changed, and the countless acts of courage and compassion that followed.
And as more years pass — and more children grow up knowing September 11 only through history books and stories — places like this become even more important.
Please visit Silver Park and take a moment to stop at the memorial.
Read it. Look closely at it. Tell its story to someone younger.
We remember. We honor. We will never forget. 🇺🇸
— Alliance Parks & Recreation