It was late afternoon on September 11, 2001. Dust hung in the air like a thick, gray wool blanket that wouldn't let you breathe. Thomas Franklin, a photographer for the Bergen Record, was wandering through the carnage of Lower Manhattan. He saw three firefighters. They were sweaty, covered in pulverized concrete, and looking for a way to find hope in a literal graveyard. They found a flag on a yacht docked nearby. They didn't ask for permission; they just took it and hiked it up a flagpole amidst the twisted steel of the World Trade Center.
That single moment, the flag raising at Ground Zero, became the defining image of American resilience.
But honestly? The story behind that photo is way messier and more human than the polished version we see in history books. People think it was a staged PR stunt. It wasn't. They think the flag in the Smithsonian is the original one. For years, it wasn't. There’s a whole saga involving missing artifacts, forensic analysis, and three guys—Dan McWilliams, George Johnson, and Billy Eisengrein—who were just trying to get through the worst day of their lives.
The Raw Reality of the Flag Raising at Ground Zero
Let's be real for a second. By 5:00 PM on 9/11, the world felt like it was ending. The North and South Towers were gone. Building 7 had just collapsed. The "pile" was a jagged mountain of smoking debris.
Dan McWilliams, a firefighter with FDNY Ladder 15, saw a flagpole on a construction trailer. It looked empty. Pathetic, even, given the surroundings. He spotted the "Star of India," a 130-foot yacht docked at North Cove. He went over, grabbed the American flag from the back of the boat, and headed back into the chaos. He didn't have a plan. He just knew he wanted to put it up.
He ran into George Johnson and Billy Eisengrein. They didn't exchange long, dramatic speeches. They just helped.
A Snapshot That Almost Didn't Happen
Thomas Franklin was standing about 30 yards away. He was using a telephoto lens. He almost didn't take the shot because he thought it was "too simple." Then he saw the composition—the three men, the vertical lines of the pole, the backdrop of destruction. He clicked the shutter.
The result was "Raising the Flag at Ground Zero." It appeared on the front page of the Record the next day. By the day after that, it was everywhere. It drew immediate comparisons to the Iwo Jima photo from World War II. People needed a win. That photo gave it to them.
The Mystery of the Missing Flag
Here is where things get weird. You'd think a piece of history like that would be locked in a vault, right?
Nope.
Shortly after the flag raising at Ground Zero, the flag became a symbol for the whole country. It was signed by Governor George Pataki and Mayors Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg. It flew at Yankee Stadium. It was held up during the Super Bowl. It even traveled to the USS Roosevelt in the Arabian Sea.
But in 2002, Shirley Dreifus, the owner of the "Star of India," noticed something. She looked at the flag that was being toured around and realized it was way too big. The flag she had on her boat was roughly 3 by 5 feet. The one being honored at ceremonies was 5 by 8 feet.
The original flag had vanished.
The Cold Case of a National Treasure
For over a decade, the most famous flag in modern American history was just... gone. Nobody knew where it was. Some thought it was stolen. Others thought it was accidentally swapped during one of the many ceremonies.
It wasn't until 2014 that a man who called himself "Brian" walked into a fire station in Everett, Washington. He had a plastic bag. Inside was a flag. He claimed he saw a segment on the History Channel show Brad Meltzer's Lost History and realized he might have the real thing. He said he’d been given it by an employee at NOAA who had received it from a 9/11 widow.
It sounds like a movie plot.
Forensic scientists spent two years analyzing the dust on the flag. They compared the hardware on the ropes to the photos Thomas Franklin took. They looked at the stitching. They even analyzed the chemical composition of the "Ground Zero dust" still embedded in the fibers.
It was a match. The flag finally made its way to the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in 2016.
Why This Image Sparked Controversy
It's not all patriotic sunshine. The flag raising at Ground Zero actually caused a fair bit of friction.
A few months after the photo went viral, there was a plan to build a bronze statue based on the image. However, the proposed design changed the ethnicities of the firefighters to be more "representative" of the FDNY's diversity.
The backlash was instant and brutal.
Firefighters and their families argued that you shouldn't "rewrite" a historical moment to fit a narrative. They argued that those three specific men were there, and changing them was a disservice to the truth. The project was eventually scrapped. It highlights a weird tension in American culture: when does a real event stop being "news" and start being "mythology"?
The Toll on the Men in the Photo
People often forget that McWilliams, Johnson, and Eisengrein had to go back to work after the photo was taken. They didn't go on a press tour immediately. They spent weeks digging for their friends.
They’ve mostly stayed out of the spotlight. They didn't want to be "famous" for being at a crime scene where 2,977 people died. That's a heavy burden to carry. When you see that photo, you’re seeing three guys exhausted beyond belief, just trying to find a reason to keep digging.
The Legacy of 9/11 Symbolism
Symbols are powerful because they're containers. We pour our emotions into them. In the weeks after the attacks, the flag raising at Ground Zero wasn't just about a piece of cloth. It was a middle finger to the people who tried to break the city.
But as time goes on, we have to be careful not to let the symbol overshadow the reality. The reality was a lot of smoke, a lot of grief, and a lot of respiratory illnesses that are still killing first responders today.
Lessons From the Pile
- Action beats despair. The firefighters didn't wait for an order to raise that flag. They just did it because it felt right.
- Documentation matters. Without Thomas Franklin’s eye, that moment would have been lost to time.
- Truth is iterative. We didn't know the flag was missing for years. We didn't know where it was for a decade. History isn't static; it's something we keep uncovering.
How to Honor the History Today
If you’re looking to actually engage with this history rather than just reading a Wikipedia summary, there are specific things you can do.
First, visit the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York. Seeing the actual flag—the one that was lost for 12 years—is a different experience in person. You can see the grime. You can see the wear. It makes the event feel less like a "story" and more like a physical reality.
Second, support the organizations that help the survivors and first responders who are still dealing with the aftermath. The flag raising at Ground Zero was a moment of triumph, but the guys in that photo and thousands of others paid a price in their health. The World Trade Center Health Program is still a critical resource for those suffering from 9/11-related cancers and respiratory issues.
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Finally, look at the other photos from that day. Not just the famous ones. Look at the photos of the people standing in line to give blood. Look at the photos of the "missing" posters taped to every lamppost in Manhattan. The flag is a great symbol, but the collective response of regular people is the real story of 9/11.
History isn't just about what happened; it's about how we choose to remember it. The flag at Ground Zero reminds us that even when the world is falling apart, we still have the agency to stand something back up.
Next Steps for Deepening Your Understanding:
Go to the official 9/11 Memorial website and look up the oral histories of the first responders. These are primary source recordings that give you the "unfiltered" version of what happened at the pile. It’s gritty, it’s heartbreaking, and it’s the best way to ensure the nuances of that day aren't lost to the passage of time. Check out the "Lost and Found" exhibit specifically if you want to see the forensic journey of the flag itself.