Biography About Rick Rescorla -- WTC Hero

BlessedBeGod, Amazon.com | 09/11/02 | BlessedBeGod

[BlessedBeGod]

FYI, a biography of Col. Rick Rescorla written by James B. Stewart has been published by Simon and Schuster.

Col. Rescorla (ret.) was a Vietnam war hero and the head of Morgan Stanley security (the largest tenant in the WTC). He is credited with helping to evacuate thousands. He was killed when 2WTC collapsed after he had gone back in to look for stragglers.

Heart of a Soldier

From Amazon:

Sometimes from the ashes of tragedy comes an extraordinary, even magical story that inspires, offers hope, and helps heal even the deepest wounds. Heart of a Soldier is such a story, one of love and friendship, danger and courage, redemption and heroism, thrillingly told by one of America's finest writers.

Susan Greer, middle-aged and divorced, had just about given up on love and romance when she met a stranger who, oddly, was jogging in his bare feet.

Born in Britain on the eve of World War II, Rick Rescorla became an American citizen and a much-decorated soldier. His extraordinary life is woven into the military conflicts of his time, from the battlefields of colonial Africa, where he and his best friend, U.S. Army officer Dan Hill, led lives of adventure worthy of Kipling and Conrad, to some of the deadliest battles of Vietnam to the epicenter of modern-day terrorism. Surviving them all with great courage and style, Rescorla seemed invincible.

Rescorla tried to put combat and death behind him, and for a time it seemed as though he had succeeded. With Susan, he found the peace and domesticity he craved. But it turned out that everything in his remarkable life was preparing him for one last act of selflessness that would transcend all that had come before. Then, on September 11, 2001, he faced the ultimate test.

Heart of a Soldier shows us bravery under fire, loyalty to one's comrades, and the miracle of finding happiness late in life. In charge of security for Morgan Stanley, Rick Rescorla successfully got 2,700 of its employees out of the World Trade Center's South Tower on September 11. Then, thinking perhaps of the soldiers who had died in his arms and of Susan, the woman who had "made his life," he went back and began climbing the tower stairs, looking for stragglers.

Heart of a Soldier is an inspiring and unforgettable story from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Den of Thieves and Blind Eye.

[BlessedBeGod]

The number of employees in the review from Amazon should read 3700, not 2700. They got it wrong.

[alisasny]

Was Col. Rick Rescorla from Franklin Square or Elmont? There is a hall over there named after him, a VFW hall perhaps. We drove by it about a month ago and I told my husband who he was.

[BlessedBeGod]

Gosh, I don't know. I hadn't heard of anything being named after him. I work for Morgan Stanley (in Chicago), and I would think it would have been announced on our company intranet page, unless the company didn't know about it, either.

[alisasny]

I am not sure either but its not a common name. Has to be in honor of him. I will look into it and bump you when I find out! I think it was on Franklin Ave in Franklin Square.

[BlessedBeGod]

Thanks !!!

[Lexington Green]

"This story shall the good man teach his son." - Henry V

[cav68]

Ananova:


Cornwall honours Sept 11 hero


A Cornish hero of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade
Centre has had a memorial unveiled in his home town.

About 100 people gathered close to the harbourside in
Hayle to remember Rick Rescorla.

Mr Rescorla was head of security for Morgan Stanley Dean
Witter and helped save 2,700 people by making sure they
left the South Tower before it collapsed.

He sang Cornish songs to keep up the spirits of those
around him, and died when the tower collapsed. His body
has never been found.

Mr Rescorla, 62, was working in the tower that day because
he was covering for another security chief who was on
holiday.

The memorial, of locally quarried granite and featuring a
locally cast relief of a bronze eagle, was unveiled near the
waterside opposite Mr Rescorla's former home in Penpol
Terrace.

The memorial, which bore the words Greater Love Hath No
Man, had been covered by a black and white Cornish flag,
and flanked by a Union flag.

Mr Rescorla's cousin, 47-year-old local publican John
Daniels, paid tribute to him at the memorial: "We all really
miss him, but we should not only be thinking of Rick, but of
the guards who perished with him, others at the World
Trade Centre and Pentagon, and those on the planes which
hit the towers."

Mr Daniels, who runs the town's Cornish Arms pub , said: "It
is a very proud day for me. I am proud of what Rick did in
New York last year, and of the fact we have got a memorial
up to mark his memory in Hayle."

He said Mr Rescorla's American wife Susan, 60, who lives
in New Jersey, was "delighted"a memorial had been
erected to her late husband and is planning to visit it.

[Ditto]

Gosh, I don't know. I hadn't heard of anything being named after him. I work for Morgan Stanley (in Chicago), and I would think it would have been announced on our company intranet page, unless the company didn't know about it, either.

Go Here, or here, (Petition to award Rick Rescorla the Presidential Medel of Freedom>

An amazing man. I'm surprised Morgan Stanley has not made his story more well known. He saved the lives of literally hundreds of their employees.

[1john2 3and4]

I am new here, and would like to direct your attention to someone whose writing has been an inspiration to me. His name is Hugh Wyatt, and he has been directing readers of his "news you can use" section to the Rescorla petition for some time now. I hope that many of you will enjoy his site, and be as inspired as I have been. http://www.coachwyatt.com/

[1john2 3and4]

rescorla/stewart on fox news now 7:56 am

[Tijeras_Slim]

ping in memory

[VOA]

another ping to you, ALHOA RONNIE...

[ventana]

Brave American Bump. V's wife.

[VOA]

To those I ping...thanks to V's wife for the ping...
and I apologize for pinging folks again for this article.
Why not ping for visibility and traffic on a Sunday for the memory of a good man...

Then, on September 11, 2001, he faced the ultimate test.

Other factoids about the Rescorla story that hit me:

1. He was the last man out of the WTC tower that the radical Islamists (from a mosque/
Afghan resettlement center in NYC funded by Osama) failed to topple in 1993.

2. Rescorla and his friend Hall (a Muslim convert, how 'bout that?) had already figured
it would be an attack from the air the next time the radical Islamists came for the WTC Towers.
Of course, Rescorla got a reputation as an obsessive-compulsive for harping on this scenario.

3. IIRC, Rescorla was originally suppossed to be on vacation on Sept. 11, 2001. I think he
traded vacation days with a fellow worker.

To me the real takehome message of Rescorla's life and sacrifice is this:
He saw the bullet coming...and on the day it arrived, he didn't flinch.
Even though probably no one would have blamed him for his first sweep and sheparding the
bulk of his charges down the stairs.
He knew the risk, stayed and paid the price.

A book review posted here (Business Week?) slammed the book for being too reverential
to Rescorla; I think the reviewers argument was Rescorla was made to look too saintly.

For me, just from what I've heard, I suspect that Rescorla was probably bigger than life,
maybe not always easy to get along with every day...but showed the good example of
what a fallible human can rise to in the clutch.
And Rescorla seemed to have made this sort of performance a major part of his life-style.
We're just lucky (especially the Morgan-Stanley employees that escaped) that
this man (not a saint) was around at the right time.

Oh, I'll also turn this into an OU Sooner bump, as Rescorla was a graduate of
the University of Oklahoma earned degrees there, including his law degree.
I suspect he may not get much in the way of public recognition there as
his resume says he was a "mercenary" in Africa before he found a new home in the USA.

[ventana]

May I offer an insight into why I pinged this? I am teaching a religion class to a bunch of eighth grade kids making their confirmation. I was at church with them this morning, and prior to service beginning I was relating to them about Lord of the Rings, and what a brilliant author Tokien was, and what a great movie was made from the book. I am trying to get across to them that we have a concept of good and evil, right and wrong, which we get from our Christian civilization, from our faith in God, and which impacts our culture, whatever your particular brand of religion. They are tv and movie kids and grasp concepts within that framework, so that's why I was working that particular angle. One kid, a tough guy, said he didn't like Lord of the Rings or Star Wars, so I said, what about We Were Soldiers Once, that was a great movie. His eyes widened and he said: "Yeah!" So, I told him about Rick Rescorla and what a hero he was. These kids live in the New York Metro area, and, in fact, many 9/ll firefighters and cops were from our neck of the woods. I described Rescorla's life as I remembered reading about it and told of his heroics at the WTC. I told the kid--it's all about discipline, good things come from discipline. Then I decided to re-read the Rescorla bio right where I read about it first: FreeRepublic. Thanks Aloha Ronnie!V's wife.

[ALOHA RONNIE]

NEVER FORGET

...For more on our Lifesaving Hero RICK RESCORLA...

...please see my Boomkarked Freerepublic.com...

...RICK RESCORLA...

.."WE WERE SOLDIERS"..

...Battle of IA DRANG-1965...

...Morgan Stanley...

..'The bravest man I ever knew'..

...Article Threads.

Simply "Hit" the ..ALOHA RONNIE..

on this Post.

GOD Bless our Blessed America...

ALWAYS

NEVER FORGET

[ALOHA RONNIE]

NEVER FORGET

...To see a TV Video of RICK RESCORLA's predicting his own death ahead of time at the hands of Muslim Fundalmentalist Extremists that was taped in his World Trade Center Tower 2 office...

...with WTC Tower 1 and the Empire State Building both standing right there behind him...

...check out our .."WE WERE SOLDLIERS".. Thread titled:

..'a short RICK RESCORLA Video Clip'

http://thealamofilm.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=259


NEVER FORGET

[BlessedBeGod]

Thanks for the link to the film, Ronnie.

[ALOHA RONNIE]

ALOHA BlessedBeGod...

See also:

http://www.lzxray.com

http://www.WeWereSoldiers.com

[537 Votes]

Could we also have a biography about the guy who had the Port Authority security guards block the South Tower stairways and decree with bull horns: "Go back to your desks!"

I'm pretty sure that guy got as far away from the South Tower the minute he could. I wouldn't be surprised if he's since been promoted.

And of course, the Legion of Idiots will now rush in and tsk tsk me for sullying the good memory of Rick Rescorla by bringing up 'revenge.' But (a) Rescorla probably wouldn't have died if this guy hadn't been in that position, and (b) if that guy is still in a position of power, his blundering will kill again.

One should always look beyond revenge to magnimity. But then, one should also look beyond magnimity to the prevention of future tragedy.