The Red Bandanna

July 11, 2016
During the World Trade Center attack, many acted with selfless bravery, risking, and often losing, their lives. ESPN correspondent Rinaldi focuses on one of these heroes, a Wall Street junior associate named Welles Crowther. Raised in privilege in New York’s Rockland County, Crowther was drawn as child to the local firehouse and eventually joined the company. Although Welles successfully navigated Wall Street after college, by the summer of 2001 he’d decided to become an N.Y.C. firefighter. Welles disappeared in the chaos of the WTC attack, but his family heard reports of a young man who’d guided people to safety from the 78th floor of the South Tower. One clue helped to identify Crowther: survivors said their protector wore a red bandana. Rinaldi crafts a meticulous and vivid portrait of Crowther’s life and the desperate hours after the jets hit, including thumbnail sketches of those he aided before the towers fell. All too often, Rinaldi projects anticipatory dread before 9/11, relating that Crowther told a friend “I’m going to be part of something big” as if what happened was somehow predestined. This emphasis on premonition tells readers more about the way humans process tragedy than about Crowther’s unquestionable courage and competence. In fact, no such embellishment is needed: the young man’s actions speak for themselves. Agent: David Black, David Black Agency.

July 15, 2016
The inspirational story of a modern-day hero who escorted dozens to safety during the 9/11 attacks.Longtime ESPN correspondent Rinaldi reconstructs the life of Welles Crowther, a fearless man responsible for saving the lives of dozens on 9/11. Already determined and passionate as a youth, Crowther grew up in a family of faith in Nyack, New York, raised by loving parents whose first date ironically occurred on Sept. 11, 1968. A competitive boy, he excelled in sports and joined his father in volunteering at the local firehouse. A lasting boyhood keepsake was a red bandanna given to him by his father; this "unexpected gift" became a prized possession and a "superhero" lucky charm to Crowther. He attended Boston College, excelled at lacrosse, and, after graduating, realized his dream of living in New York City and began working as an equities trader on the 104th floor of the World Trade Center's South Tower, though he had future aspirations to formally become a firefighter. In the frantic minutes following the first plane's impact on 9/11, Crowther took to the stairwells searching for survivors and encountered a crowd of injured people whom he managed to rescue, even carrying one on his back as he descended a stairway. Rinaldi incorporates many survivor accounts of those who later told the media of a mysterious man with his face covered with a red handkerchief who saved them only to ascend back into the building looking for others. Crowther perished as the tower collapsed after aiding the fire department as a civilian usher, yet his heroic legacy, lauded by President Barack Obama, is eternally memorialized at the 9/11 tribute site. With dramatic, only occasionally maudlin prose, Rinaldi captures the compelling urgency of the indelible event and fondly tips his hat to Crowther, an exemplary embodiment of human compassion and selflessness. A moving, deeply felt tribute to a courageous individual who sacrificed his life to save others.

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April 15, 2016
From his father, the red bandanna Welles Crowther always carried helped identify him after 9/11, when survivors remembered him leading others to safety until he was lost in the rubble. President Barack Obama told his story at the opening of the 9/11 Museum at ground zero. From ESPN correspondent Rinaldi.

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