9/11 | Thinking of Rob

All week we’ve been asking you guys to send us your 9/11 stories. This morning I received an e-mail from Emily. Emily is not a ToR reader, nor is she involved in the Rob fandom in any way. Her e-mail left me feeling shocked, as most 9/11 stories usually do. This one was a bit different though. It came from someone who had lost her cousin on 9/11, however each time she tried to Google his name she would only stumble on Robert Pattinson fan sites. You see, her cousin’s name is very similar to Rob’s. His name is Robert Edward Pattison.

I debated with myself about the best way to write this post. I wanted to honour her cousin’s memory without putting the focus on Rob. He deserves to be remembered for who he was and not because his name is similar to a Rob’s. He was a star in his very own way and he meant the world to the people who knew him. I also felt that it wasn’t fair to him or to his family that every time they googled his name they were unable to find anything about him. Hence this post.

We felt like we owed Emily something. Everyone deserves a special place to be remembered. Maybe the next time when she Googles her cousin’s name, she’ll stumble on a post about him on a Rob site. So we dedicate this post to Robert E. Pattison and to Emily and her family. May his life never be forgotten and may his star always shine down on them.

In her e-mail Emily said the following:

“I thought maybe your readers would enjoy reading an article about a real hero who shares a couple of similar names with your hollywood one.”

and she sent me a link to an article that you can find below.

From The Wicked Local:

He called it “the top of the world.”

It was the 110^th floor of the World Trade Center’s North Tower and that’s where 40-year-old Bob Pattison worked at the job he loved, tending transmitters for WCBS-TV.

“The last time I saw him in April, we talked about life up on the roof,” his younger brother, Brendan, would say during a eulogy at St. Charles Church. “Bob had told me how amazing the view was and how truly awesome the power of the wind was.”

Woburn native Robert “Bob” Pattison was working in the wind Sept. 11, 2001, 10 years ago this week, when a terrorist-piloted jet slammed into the North Tower at about 466 mph. His family has been led to believe he and his CBS coworkers survived the impact but perished when the structure collapsed nearly an hour and a half later. It took some four years for his partial remains, identified through DNA, to be returned to Woburn.

He was one of nearly 3,000 who died during the day’s coordinated attack

You can read his full story here. Emily also left new links in the comments.

From The Mix Tape:

As Americans reflect on the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, it is a good time to look back on some of the films that tried to capture this moment in American history by giving an on-screen experience to the widespread, unfathomable devastation.

Here are five films we’re thinking about this week as we remember those lost on that tragic day.

–

Remember Me (2010)

“Remember Me” was not marketed as a film about Sept. 11 or terrorism, but the fall of the World Trade Center does factor into the plot of this love story starring Robert Pattinson and Emilie de Ravin. The film, directed by Allen Coulter and written by Will Fetters, gives subtle hints to the Sept. 11 subplot throughout the film. In the beginning of the film, the audience is told the film is set in New York City in 2001, but it would take a keen viewer to connect the dots, as the year isn’t mentioned again until the very end of the film. “Remember Me” is not a happy romantic film. The story focuses on two lovers: Tyler (Pattinson) and Ally (de Ravin) who are beginning a relationship as they try to get over Ally’s mother’s murder and the divorce of Tyler’s parents in the wake of his brother’s suicide. “Remember Me” will air on TMC at 5:25 p.m. Saturday.

Check out the rest of the list here.