{"id":13698,"date":"2021-09-11T13:36:29","date_gmt":"2021-09-11T13:36:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.golive.clarku.edu\/news\/2021\/09\/11\/my-father-my-hero\/"},"modified":"2026-09-09T17:05:43","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T21:05:43","slug":"my-father-my-hero","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2021\/09\/11\/my-father-my-hero\/","title":{"rendered":"My father. My hero."},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n

\u00a0On a perfect late-summer morning, New York firefighter Salvatore Torcivia declined an overtime shift so that he could accompany his 3-year-old daughter, Mariah, to her first day of preschool at a YMCA near their Staten Island home. Not long after they arrived, a thick plume of dark smoke rose over the city. It was September 11, 2001.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mariah Torcivia \u201920, M.S. \u201921, was too young at the time, so the ensuing details have been relayed to her by her mother and father over the years: How Salvatore rushed to reach the fallen towers, navigating his way through the frightened crowds who were streaming away from the devastation. How he was gone for days, sifting through the ruins for victims, and returned home covered in the ash that haunted Ground Zero.<\/p>\n\n\n\n