GREEN TOWNSHIP, Ohio — Off a suburban highway, a mangled piece of metal stands out among green lawns and manicured gardens. The steel seems strong but bent and twisted. It’s adorned with flags and flowers and on its side reads “S7.”


What You Need To Know

  • Green Township received one of the largest pieces of steel from the World Trade Center

  • More than 2,600 pieces of steel were donated to firefighters, museums and other nonprofits across the world

  • Green Township’s former district chief assisted with search and rescue on 9/11

  • Three firefighters drove from Ohio to New York to bring back the steel and erect it outside their fire station

  • Every year, Green Township hosts a memorial service

“This came from the seventh floor and there were 90 some floors above it that fell on top of this,” Dan Gallagher said.

He would know, as he one of three retired firefighters who brought it home from New York to put on display in front of his fire station.

Gallagher and Ruberg look over piece of World Trade Steel

Twenty years after the World Trade Center fell, its 200,000 tons of steel have been repurposed and recycled, but more than 2,600 pieces were set aside to memorialize the nearly 3,000 people killed in the 9/11 terror attacks.

Those steel artifacts are now scattered across 50 states and 10 different countries, and 10 years ago, one of the largest pieces sat on the back of a truck trailer as firefighters Gallagher and Russ Ruberg, along with their former district chief Ed Thomas brought it back to Green Township.

The New York City Port Authority offered the 24-foot steel donation to the township thanks primarily to the work of a local woman, Linda Tenhundfeld. The firefighters said she worked for two years, to ensure it would be the center piece of the township’s 9/11 memorial.

“She had the connections in New York, she had firefighter friends that lived in New York, ” Ruberg said.

Tenhundfeld wasn’t the only connection between New York and the township, however. Thomas remembers vividly learning about the news the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. As a member of Ohio Task Force One, he said he was deployed almost immediately to ground zero.

“We drove straight through into Manhattan and got there in the middle of the night,” he said.

Thomas worked alongside the search and rescue team for about two weeks uncovering survivors and victims, many of whom, were other first responders. When Thomas returned with Ruberg and Gallagher to retrieve the steel 10 years later, he said the memories came flooding back.

Firefighters dedicate steel at memorial; courtesy Green Township

“Another firefighter’s your brother, period,” he said. “No matter what country or unit or state you go in. If one firefighter sees something that another firefighter needs, they’re gonna take care of it and those are some of the things I think of when I see that steel.”

At 24 feet, the steel would have been the largest 9/11 display in Ohio, but when the trio of firefighters tried to get it on their trailer they realized they couldn’t take it home in one piece.

“That was a pretty big debate for us, we didn’t have the heart to cut it,” Ruberg said. “We figured the only way to get it back was to cut it in half and stack it next to each other on the trailer.”

Ruberg said the steelworkers at the Brooklyn port, considered it an honor to split the piece into two nearly identical pieces. 

Courtesy of Russ Ruberg

The firefighters then loaded it onto the trailer, attached a banner explaining what it was and where it was going, and set off for an eventful drive home.

“People could read what it was and they would just pull up next to us and honk their horns,” Ruberg recalled. “In the middle of nowhere, this random exit, we’re filling up with gas in our trucks, and we had those banners on the side and all of a sudden people started coming.”

It was shortly after they left their hotel in Pennsylvania. Ruberg said people started lining up around the gas station to see the steel, then a few took out markers and began to sign the banner.

Ruberg wanted to know why.

“Finally, I asked one of the people that question," he said. "And she said, ‘You know where you’re at?’ and we said, ‘No?’ And she said, ‘You’re at the only exit for Shanksville, Pennsylvania.’ And that’s where the other plane went down was there.”

Ruberg and Gallagher said that moment still gives them goosebumps 10 years later.

Courtesy of Russ Ruberg

Once the trip was over, the firefighters and the steel got a hero’s welcome back in Green Township. Half of the steel stayed there in front of Green Township’s civic center and the fire headquarters. The other went to the Cincinnati Fire Museum for their traveling exhibit.

Green Township’s memorial saw an official dedication in 2013 and all three firefighters were in attendance. 

“I believe that it’s very very important that we keep the memory of what happened that day and the sacrifices that were made that day alive,” Thomas said.

Every time they look at that steel, Ruberg and Gallagher said they feel a sense of kinship with the New York City firefighters they watched respond to the tragedy in real time.

“All I kept thinking about were all the firefighters that were in there and I knew they’d be streaming in there by the hundreds,” Ruberg said. “It’s what any firefighter would do.”

While all three firefighters are retired, they said the memorial outside their station ensures the story of what happened that day will never fade from the memories of the firefighters who have since replaced them.

Thomas said he made sure of it when the new recruits were trained.

“That day changed not only the fire service but it changed the way that we have to carry on our normal day,” he said.

Freshly placed flowers and memorial flags show the firefighters the community hasn’t forgotten either.

Every year, the memorial hosts a 9/11 remembrance acknowledging where the steel came from, and the countless lives destroyed and changed the day the towers came crashing down.

The 20th anniversary memorial service will take place Saturday, September 11 at 9:00 a.m. outside the civic center.