Lakeside’s Maine Avenue Revitalization Association and The Lakeside Historical Society is holding its fourth annual Lakeside 9/11 Memorial Walk 2024 on Sept. 11. The walk will begin at Mary’s Donuts at 6:15 p.m. and ends at the Lakeside Historical Society at 6:30 p.m. where the walkers, and community members will join for memories, music and more.
Memorial Walk coordinator Judy Tanimoto Coz said MARA member Barbara Channel came up with the idea for the memorial walk.
“It was during COVID, and because we were all in lockdown, and they solely let people out of their homes, she decided we needed a 9/11 memorial walk, and wanted to gather the community together,” she said. “The boy scouts would lead the walk over to the Historical Society where we would have a MC. [Lakeside Union School District Trustee] Andrew Hayes has been our master of ceremonies for the past four years.”
Coz said at the event, there will be speakers, music, along with the memorial, along with the 9/11 car on display.
“The San Diego Air & Space Museum will be there with its 9/11 Police Car which is actually one of the actual police cars from the 9/11 that was damaged at ground zero,” she said. “This is their second year coming, and they park the car in front of the Historical Society. It is pretty amazing.”
According to the San Diego Air & Space Museum, the police car on display and its occupants were deployed as first responders to the scene of the World Trade Center Twin Towers on September 11, 2001. There, the first of two hijacked airliners slammed into the 87th floor of the north tower. When the towers collapsed, the debris rained down on the streets below and crushed or damaged many vehicles beyond recognition or repair. Nothing is known about the occupants of the car or from where it was dispatched, but the damage it endured is clearly visible. The car was stored at a Port Authority site untouched for the past 15 years and is on loan to the museum from the Port Authority.
Coz said the Memorial Walk will be led by the Lakeside Carter-Smith VFW Post’s Cub Scouts Troop 346. The El Capitan High School Marching Vaqueros band will march, led by Music Director Kyle Hildebrant. Speakers include MARA President Joel Scalitti, owner of Mary’s Donuts. The Pledge of Allegiance will be led by USA Ambassador California Jr. Teen, 14-year-old Bianca Villalobos, and a prayer will be led by East Valley Christian Fellowship Pastor Jason Zullo. Lakeside Middle School eight grader and former Pre- Teen Junior Miss Lakeside 2023 Madison Marshall will sing the national anthem, with lead vocal of The Whole Sha-Bang Band Kelly Rice singing “God Bless The USA.”
The event will have two “storytellers,” Beth Cross who has lived in Lakeside since 2010, who was blocks away from the Pentagon while on a field school trip, and Juanita Curtice who has traveled to all three crash sites.
