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Brooklyn College Magazine — Spring 2002
In Memoriam 9/11
Ernest Alikakos, forty-three,
played basketball every Friday night in a high school gymnasium in Manhattan.
"He was a very accurate shooter," his younger brother, George, remembers.
"He had a terrific set-shot." The two boys grew up on Underhill Street
in Prospect Heights and attended St. Constantine and Helen Cathedral in downtown
Brooklyn, where they learned Greek and Ernest was an altar boy.
A few years after graduating
from Brooklyn College with a B.S. in accounting, Alikakos joined the New York
State Department of Taxation and Finance as a tax auditor. "He was a nice
guy and got along with people," his brother remembers. "It was a tough
job, but he was very fair."
He liked to travel and made several trips to Vancouver. In his spare time Alikakos
read, listened to classical music, and went out to dinner with his brother.
"He was in a new relationship, and things were looking up," George
remembers.
Adored by his coworkers,
Ezra Aviles had their well-being in mind before his own. After Flight 11 struck
One World Trade Center, Aviles remained on the phone in his office on the sixty-first
floor, calling officials, describing the crash, giving emergency guidelines,
and warning colleagues to stay away from the building. As the senior manager
for strategic planning and development for the Port Authority of New York and
New Jersey, Aviles,
forty-one, was instrumental in helping others escape.
He was born in Far Rockaway and earned his bachelor's degree at York College,
where he met his wife of twenty-one years, Mildred Marti. A committed environmentalist,
Aviles received a master's degree in geology from Brooklyn College in 1987.
He always took his three children to school on the first day each fall and never
missed a dance recital or soccer game.
On the evening of September
10, 2001, Eustace "Rudy" Bacchus told his teenage daughter, Carla,
that he was not going to be around forever and that she would have to fend for
herself. The following morning, Bacchus, forty-eight, an independent trader
on the American Stock Exchange and former vice-president of Merrill Lynch, was
attending a meeting at Windows on the World in the World Trade Center when the
first plane struck.
Bacchus was born in Guyana and settled in Queens at age thirteen. He received
his bachelor's degree from Brooklyn College in 1983 and regarded as one of his
greatest accomplishments becoming a member of the Securities and Exchange Commission
after passing the exam on his first attempt. A decade ago, he gave up going
to dance clubs and became a deacon at his church, assisting parishioners with
mortgage payments and college tuition and helping them define their financial
goals. Bacchus lived in Metuchen, N.J., with his wife, Juanna, and
two children.
Steven H. Berger, forty-five, enjoyed the small things in life. He was known by colleagues and loved ones as the guy who liked reading encyclopedias, cooking (he was nicknamed Emeril after the Food Channel chef), getting the right answers on such television shows as Jeopardy! and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, and raking leaves with his twelve-year-old daughter, Melissa. He spent four hours a day commuting from his home in Manalapan, N.J., to his job as supervisor of corporate tax auditors at the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance, a position he loved. "He was pleased by the little things," said his wife, Susan Sobel Berger, '79. "He did not need any of the big things that some people do. He loved working in the World Trade Center. He had the view of the city."
Andre Cox was just twenty-two
years old when he arrived in America from the Caribbean island of St. Vincent.
He wanted to be with his brothers in Canarsie. He wanted to build a future for
himself.
Every morning, he got up before dawn to arrive at his job at Cantor Fitzgerald's
cafeteria on the 101st floor of One World Trade Center by 6 a.m. By 3 p.m.,
he was back on the train, heading for Brooklyn College to attend evening classes.
Most nights, he didn't get home until 11 p.m. For seven years this was his routine,
leaving little time to experience the joys that a young man's life usually revolves
around. But this past summer, it seemed that everything he had done so far to
get somewhere in life was beginning to pay off. Cox, who was twenty-nine, received
his bachelor's degree in computer science and began to send out résumés.
The dreams that had propelled him from his homeland
must have appeared to be shimmering on the horizon.
Peter Freund was always
doing something different. He graduated from Brooklyn College with a degree
in computer science but went on to become a fireman, spending the last five
years at Engine Company 55 in Little Italy, the third company to arrive at the
World Trade Center.
Recently, though, Freund, who was forty-five, was planning to pursue a new career
as a mathematics teacher. He looked forward to a regular schedule and more time
with his family. He lived in a small upstate town and, when he wasn't busy coaching
his four children's sports teams, he was tinkering with projects. On the two
acres surrounding the family home in Westtown, Freund built an observatory with
a retractable roof, star charts, a telescope with a camera mounted on it-and
speakers so he could listen to the Grateful Dead while studying the sky.
"I don't think he ever regretted a day in his life," said his wife,
Robin. The week after September 11, a letter arrived from Westtown High School,
accepting Freund's teaching application. His wife hopes to organize the construction
of an athletic field for local youth to be named after her husband.
John Giordano was a family
man who surrounded his wife and their three young children with two passions-
music and the environment.
Giordano, forty-seven, graduated from Brooklyn College with a bachelor's degree
in geology and was finishing his master's thesis in environmental science at
Bard College while working in the Hazardous Material 1 Special Operations Battalion
Engine 37, Battalion 11, 3rd Division.
A born teacher-the profession he was going to pursue after completing his master's
degree-Giordano used every chance he got to teach his children about the local
environment, particularly the Hudson River, which was his thesis subject.
As a classically trained guitarist, he loved to teach music to neighborhood
children and inspired his daughter to study the clarinet and his son the saxophone.
At his memorial service last October, his daughter's school chorus celebrated
his life in song.
Paul Lisson's quiet life
almost passed without being noted.
Lisson, forty-five, graduated from Brooklyn College in 1980 with a degree in
economics. His parents divorced when he was young and, living with his mentally
ill mother whom he took care of until she died, he grew up to be painfully shy
and socially awkward. But Lisson's few friends and his coworkers appreciated
his sweetness-the surprise birthday presents that he gave them and his many
modest acts of kindness and courtesy. These were the memories that came to people
when Lisson, an employee of the document management contractor Pitney Bowes
who was assigned to the Aon Corporation, did not show up in their lives again
after September 11. And so, a missing persons report was filed by the woman
who cut his hair, his father was contacted by Lisson's closest friend, and they
gathered together to celebrate his solitary life.
Firefighter Gregory T. Saucedo was born and raised in Old Mill Basin, Brooklyn, and graduated from South Shore High School. Planning on a career in teaching, Saucedo earned a bachelor's degree in education from Brooklyn College, but ended up following his older brother Stephen into the New York City Fire Department. He served eleven years, originally with Engine Company 321 in Gerritsen Beach, Brooklyn, and most recently with Ladder Company 5 in Greenwich Village. Saucedo, thirty-one, went to the gym and ran six miles a day to keep in top physical shape. On September 11 he was last seen climbing the stairs of One World Trade Center, helping others to safety.
Ian Schneider began working
in the mailroom at Cantor Fitzgerald while he was still a student at Brooklyn
College. "That's why it took him five and a half years to finish,"
remembers Schneider's fraternal twin brother, Joel, '77. "There were a
lot of people in that company with degrees from more prestigious universities,
but to Ian's credit, and to the credit of Brooklyn College, he rose to the top
ranks of management there."
As a senior managing director at Cantor Fitzgerald, Schneider, forty-five, headed
a team of bond traders on the 104th floor of One World Trade Center. He and
his wife, Cheryl, and their three children made their home in Short Hills, N.J.,
where Schneider coached his kids' Little League baseball teams and the soccer,
basketball, and softball teams of the Millburn-Short Hills Recreation Department.
"He was very, very bright," recalls his brother, "and knew what
it took to be successful. He had an incredibly dynamic personality and a great
sense of humor-ask anyone who knew him."
Robert Twomey wanted to be a biologist, and after graduating from Brooklyn College he began his graduate work in cell biology at the University of Georgia. But Twomey returned to Brooklyn with his wife, Marie, to raise their two sons, Emeric and Robert, and joined his brother-in-law's brokerage firm. Though the Sheepshead Bay native became a successful trader on the American Stock Exchange, he never lost his love for biology, botany, and entomology and dreamed of one day retiring from Wall Street to become a public school teacher. He and his brother-in-law were having breakfast at Windows on the World when the attack began.
As a boy in Greece, Paul
Zois, forty-six, never had time to play. So ball games with his children, Stefania
and Theo, were sacred. Zois was a travel consultant with American Express Corporate
Services on the ninety-fourth floor of One World Trade Center. Nearly every
day after work, Zois went to the children's practices and games. "You should
see our yard," said his wife, Dorota. "We have more balls and nets
than you can imagine." He also loved coaching soccer and basketball teams.
Zois immigrated to the United States when he was nine and earned his bachelor's
degree from Brooklyn College in 1978. The week before the attack, Zois ordered
a pair of high-quality soccer shoes from a catalog for Theo. The shoes arrived
on September 12.