Posted Dec 9, 2010, 11:24 AM
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New Yorker for life
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Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Borough of Jersey
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http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/...ll.html?r=news
Bright lights and big hearts fill World Trade Center workers' holiday gift to city
Electricians took it upon themselves to use cellophane-wrapped light bulbs to decorate Freedom Tower (b.), which is under construction, in holiday colors.
Michael Daly
December 9th 2010
Quote:
Joe Russo was in his Staten Island home two weekends ago when he made a pronouncement that would result in the most beautiful sight in the city.
"I don't think I'm going to put up the tree this year," the 49-year-old electrician would recall saying. "I got a better idea."
"What's that?" asked his wife, Kathleen Russo.
"I'm going to light up the whole tower and see what it looks like," Joe Russo said.
He was speaking of the Freedom Tower, where he is a journeyman with Local 3, part of the Five Star Electric team. He arrived there the following Monday with various hues of cellophane purchased at a Michael's crafts store.
"Red, green, yellow, purple, whatever I could grab," he recalled.
Russo broached his idea to Gary Timm, the 59-year-old light and power foreman.
"Give it a shot," Timm said. "See what it looks like."
Russo needed only two minutes to wrap cellophane around a 250-watt construction light and secure it with cellophane tape. He did the south and east sides of three floors in an hour.
The idea had yet to be approved by Frank Leonard, the 45-year-old general foreman. He saw the lights the next morning before Russo arrived for work.
"Who did that?" Leonard asked.
"Why do you want to know?" Timm replied.
Leonard made his judgment known.
"Outstanding."
Leonard had been talking with other electricians about doing something special for the holidays. Nobody had to tell any of them they are laboring at a sacred place.
"Everybody really takes it to heart what we're doing here," Leonard later noted. "It's a special place. You think about who was here and what happened."
Leonard, Timm and Russo were also following an impulse that goes back at least to 1931, when construction workers put up the first Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center.
"It's in the genes," Russo said.
Russo started as an apprentice at the World Trade Center in 1981. He now ended the day with seven more floors of multicolored Christmas lights. These were topped by three floors of blue signifying Chanukah. Two above those were lit a symbolic yellow.
"Candles," Leonard said.
The overall effect was all the more wonderful for looking like exactly what it was: something workers with rough hands and gentle hearts had taken it upon themselves to do.
"No one directed us to do it," Leonard said. "It definitely came from within.
"Just bring a smile to people's faces, you know what I mean?"
The smile was joined by a welling in the eyes of retired Firefighter Lee Ielpi, who lost his firefighter son on 9/11 and is now the guiding force behind the Tribute WTC Visitor Center.
"Powerful," he said as he gazed across The Pit at the lights of purest holiday spirit. "Beautiful. It comes from the heart."
On Saturday night, Russo took his wife to the site to show her the lights. She celebrates her birthday on Christmas Day.
"That's for your birthday," he said.
On Tuesday night, Russo came home from work to discover she had gone ahead and put up the tree.
"The tree was beautiful," he said yesterday.
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