9/11 REMEMBERED: Eileen Rice, everyday hero
Lesli Rice was a 20-year-old Ridgeite attending ConnecticutCollege on September 11, 2001. Two weeks prior, she had had afalling-out with her mother, Eileen, an administrative assistantfor Marsh & McLennan, an investment firm located on the 99thfloor of the World Trade Center’s north tower.
It was 9:27 and my phone rang, Rice, who now lives in NewJersey with a five-year-old son, recalled. I lay in my bed and waslike, God, I really hope it’s not my mom. I really don’t want totalk to her now.’
But something made her pick up to answer a call from a friendstudying in Australia for the semester. She said that the WorldTrade Center had been hit by a plane, Rice said. It took me asecond to process what she was saying to me. All of a sudden Ithought, Oh my God, my mom works there!’ I knew she was dead;somehow I just knew.