By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Princeton’s Sept. 11 memorial will not be ready in time for this year’s 11th anniversary next week of the terrorist attack, said the local firefighter leading the effort to create the memorial.
The project is still in the design stage, although organizers already have a site picked out. The proposed location is on the lawn south of Borough Hall.
Princeton Deputy Fire Chief Roy James said Wednesday that the site is important because he wants the memorial to be seen and remembered, not forgotten as it would be if it were in a less-prominent place.
One holdup has been getting state approval, as the site is owned by the state.
”We’re kind of in a holding pattern,” he said.
The memorial will include a 9-foot steal beam from the World Trade Center and the names of the Princeton residents killed on Sept. 11, 2001,he said. The design, announced in June, calls for lime stone pillars, memorial stones and paving panels adorned with poetry.
Merilee Meacock, a partner with KSS Architects that is working on the project, said Thursday that the public would play a role by carving out obelisks that are planned for the memorial. There will be future workshops on stone carving that the public will be invited to attend, although dates and locations have not been chosen, she said.
The steel beam arrived in March, having made the trip under escort from a New York Fire Department firehouse in Brooklyn to New Jersey; it is being kept at the Princeton firehouse on Harrison Street, Mr. James said. He did not know which of the Twin Towers the beam came from but said he plans to investigate to learn the answer.
The Sept. 11 attack hits home for Mr. James. He counts his wife, Karen, as one of the survivors, since she worked in lower Manhattan, although not in the World Trade Center. Pregnant at the time with the couple’s daughter, Mrs. James was put on bed rest by her doctor after she was diagnosed with gestational diabetes and preeclampsia.
”She could’ve been there,” Mr. James said.
There has been some concern surrounding the memorial because a cross had been cut out of the steal beam. Mr. James explained that steelworkers during rescue efforts had cut out crosses and stars of David and presented them to victims’ families.
Borough and township officials had expressed concern about a potential lawsuit due to having a religious image on public property, Mr. James said. He said officials from both towns had suggested covering the cross, filling it in or positioning the steel so the cross is either upside down or otherwise not facing the public.
”They don’t want to have it where it may cause an issue,” he said.
David French, an attorney for the American Center for Law and Justice, a conservative legal group based in Washington, D.C., said Wednesday that the chance of a lawsuit against the memorial succeeding is “extraordinarily remote.” He said the display has a secular purpose, and noted that neither Mr. James nor the Princetons were responsible for carving out the cross.
Borough Councilwoman Jo S. Butler said Wednesday that she had been taken aback about the “deliberateness” of the cross, noting that someone had to work hard to put the image there. Yet she said she did not have a problem with the image.
”I can’t imagine that it would be held up because of that,” she said.
Mr. James, who is Jewish, said it is “not my job or anyone’s job to alter this treasure.”
He thinks that covering up the cross would not tell the whole story of what happened at the World Trade Center.
”History has many stories,” he said. “By getting rid of one of the stories, you’re not revealing the true history.”

