Primary Theme – Remembering: The memorial at the Flight 93 site provides a focus to commemorate a seminal event in American history, a place to remember and celebrate the passengers and crew on the flight.

Research Finding – Nearly all visitors advocated for preserving and protecting the memory of the actions of Flight 93 passengers and crew.

Supporting Description - Visitors see the Memorial primarily as a witness for actions of Flight 93 passengers and crew. People see the need for a reminder of what was lost, what was gained, heroism, sacrifice, bravery, and freedom. This is part of what makes the Memorial sacred—the desire of the living to remember that which is larger than regular day to day life. This feeling of remembrance is deep, powerful, and expressed in a wide variety of ways. It probably is the most consistent expression in the conversation circles.

Sample Supporting Interpretive Theme Statement - Perhaps the best way Flight 93 passengers and crew can be honored is by their being remembered.

Illustrative Quotes -

“That the memories of the people are not lost and what they did and the events that happened aren’t lost.” [Visitor, July 2008, Conversation Circle]

“[You both said it was important to remember in some way. What is important to remember in your view?] The accident itself. The crash itself and the people that was lost….I think it’s important, the feeling that you had that day… don’t lose it because in your everyday life you can lose some of the urgency, some of the feelings and something of what happened because now our lives have gone on. The world didn’t end. It’s gone on and you have a tendency to forget it. But you can’t forget how you felt that day and how urgent you felt that it was that day.[What would happen if you forgot? Say more about that.] History repeats itself. If you don’t remember it history repeats itself and we’ve got to do something so history doesn’t repeat itself, which I don’t think we’ve done.” [Visitors, October 2008, Conversation Circle]

“It would be kind of nice to incorporate when they do the part (inaudible 13:19-13:20) possibly where they have the photos, it would be kind of nice if they would have a brief bio of each passenger possibly just name, maybe where they came from. I am curious where they were traveling to, was this business, was it pleasure? It would be kind of nice if they just had a small paragraph possibly to incorporate that as part of the park, as the memorial. I mean we hear a lot about all the people who were important that day and unfortunately we don’t always hear about some of the other ones…I think that was one of the nicest things during the presentation when she was hitting on certain people, just interesting facts about who was the oldest on board, who were the youngest, you know which citizens whatever may be definitely something where we remember each one of them because they were each unique in their own capacity.” [Visitors, July 2008, Conversation Circle]

“…for me it’s the only one I hadn’t see yet, and, you know, you gotta, I mean it’s a, a quaint phrase that’s getting to be overused, but I mean, you know, you don’t want to forget, I mean, complacently leads to repetitiveness, you know, you need to keep this, this needs to sting forever, to a certain extent, I mean, people need to know what, what, you know, what happened, and what different people throughout the three locations and throughout the country did, you know, in reaction and non-reaction to what happened” [Visitor, July 2008, Conversation Circle]

“Everybody wants to be a part of, it’s not so much be a part of they want to say, “Hey, ya know, we recognize what happened here and this is me leaving this….I’m here and I admire what you did”  [Visitor, July 2008, Conversation Circle]

“It’s imperative to honor the heroics of these people. They have got to be remembered” [Visitor, October 2008, Conversation Circle]

“You can’t forget the people. That’s it, you just can’t forget the people” [Visitor, October 2008, Conversation Circle]

“I’d like to see the forty people on that plane get as much credit as possible for what they did. [You spoke earlier about their bravery. Are there other aspects of what they did that you think is worth noting?] I’m not much of an expert on that, but they made some pretty big sacrifices for their family. I was here just at the tail end of your ranger speech about how they were on the phone calling people at the last minute saying, “hey, it’s likely over” and I’d just like to see them get credit for that.” [Visitor, October 2008, Conversation Circle]