Never forget: “Northport knew my dad alive”

Jessica Trant, daughter of Daniel Patrick Trant, was the guest speaker at yesterday’s 9/11 memorial in Northport Village. Below is Jessica’s speech, shared with her permission, in its entirety. 

There is no place that means more to me when it comes to honoring my dad than Northport.

When most people hear the name Daniel Trant, they think of Cantor Fitzgerald. The 104th floor of the North Tower. And September 11th. But Northport knew him before the worst thing that ever happened to him became the first thing people knew about him.

Here, he was Danny.

This is where my parents bought their first home. It’s where they raised three kids, made lifelong friends, and built a life together. Back then, it felt ordinary. We never imagined how extraordinary it would one day feel to us.

My dad played pickup basketball on the court at Bellerose. He got his hair cut at Rockabilly’s. He seemed to know everyone. And somehow, everyone knew him. He was funny. He was loyal. And when something went wrong, he was the person we looked to. Because when Dad was there, life felt less complicated. We felt safe.

Northport knew my dad alive. That is what makes standing here tonight so personal for me.

On September 11, 2001, my dad went to work at Cantor Fitzgerald and never came home. I was 19 years old. My brothers were 12 and 10. My mom was only 39. She lost her husband. We lost our father. And Northport lost one of its own.

But we were not the only family in this town whose life was divided into a before and an after that morning. Northport lost nine people: Ronald Comer. Daniel Trant. Daniel Smith. Kevin Murphy. Thomas Farrelly. Michael Duffy. Lorenzo Ramsey. Karen Hagerty. Philip Hayes.

Nine people whose lives were still unfolding. Nine people who had somewhere to be that night. Someone waiting for them. Plans that had nothing to do with becoming names read aloud at a memorial.

For much of the world, September 11th eventually became history. For our families, it never did.

My dad was 40 years old when he died. I am now older than he ever got to be. There is something about that I still cannot fully explain.

When you are young, 40 sounds old. Then you get there. And you realize just how young it really is. He should have watched my brothers become men. He should have grown old with my mother. He should have become a grandfather. He should still be here. Giving us advice we did not ask for. Making fun of us. Getting on our nerves. Making us laugh. He should still be Dad.

When he was taken from us, Northport showed up. People came to our house. They checked on my mom. They looked after my brothers and me. They left food at our door, often without knocking or waiting to be thanked.

Someone simply knew that a family was hurting. And maybe we should not have to worry about dinner that night. There was nothing anyone could say to make it better. I think people understood that. So they did something even more important.

They stayed.

No one could put our family back together. But this town made sure we did not carry it alone. When your life falls apart, you remember who stays. Northport stayed. And for the last 25 years, Northport has helped keep my dad here.

At St. Philip Neri, children walk into a gymnasium that bears his name. Most of them never met him. They do not know how much he loved basketball, competition, or being part of a team. But his name is there, in a place that feels like him.

And then there is Robert Pavinelli, though everyone here knows him as Pav. Pav was my dad’s best friend. For 25 years, he has carried my father with him. Through the basketball camp. Through the Dan Trant Classic. And through every story he still tells.

Grief does not belong only to family. Friends lose people too. And Pav lost someone he loved.

He could have let time turn my dad into a story from long ago. Instead, he kept finding ways to bring my dad’s name into the lives of children who were not even born when he died.

Those kids may never have met Danny Trant. But because of Pav, a piece of him is still on that basketball court. I do not know if one friend can give another a greater gift than refusing to let the world forget him.

Tonight, that remembrance belongs to all nine people Northport lost.

Nearly 3,000 people were murdered on September 11th. We say that number so often that I worry people have stopped hearing it. A number cannot tell you what someone’s laugh sounded like. It cannot show you a father coaching his children. Or a husband dancing with his wife in the living room. It cannot tell you who was supposed to be sitting at the dinner table that night.

That is why we say their names. Not to return them to the way they died, but to remember how they lived.

For years, I ran from what happened to my dad. I was 19. I did not know how to carry what I knew about his final morning. Honestly, I am not sure anyone could have taught me. So for a long time, I pushed it away. It was the only way I knew how to survive.

But grief does not disappear because you refuse to look at it. Eventually, mine became a responsibility.

I started traveling to Guantánamo because I needed to understand what happened to my dad. I needed the truth. And I needed to fight for the accountability our families were promised. Twenty-five years later, we should not still be waiting for justice.

But tonight does not belong to the men who murdered them. They have already taken enough.

Tonight belongs to the people who should still be here. And to everyone who kept loving them after they were gone.

It belongs to the friends who kept telling their stories. And to the neighbors who quietly showed up. It belongs to Pav. It belongs to the people who fed my family when we could barely understand how life was supposed to continue. And it belongs to this town. A town that saw my mother lose her husband and three children lose their father, and decided we would not be left alone.

I have never forgotten what Northport did for my family. I never will.

And to the families of the other eight people Northport lost, I know my grief is not the only grief in this room. The people you love should be here too. They should have come home that night. They should have had these past 25 years with you. Their names belong here. Their lives mattered here.

And Northport has not forgotten them.

And to my dad… When I think of you, I try not to let my mind go to the 104th floor. I try to bring you home. I see the five of us around the dinner table. Mom putting together whatever simple meal we were having. All of us talking over one another. You making some comment. One of us getting yelled at. Someone laughing. 

At the time, it was just dinner. 

That is the cruel thing about ordinary moments. You do not know what they are worth while you are living them. Then one day, you would give anything to sit in one of them again.

I see you and Mom dancing in the living room to Al Green, Janis Joplin or Earth, Wind and Fire.  I see you helping me get ready for prom. Taking pictures with me right down here in this park. I was worried about my dress and where I was going afterward. I had no idea that one day, the only thing I would care about in those pictures was that my dad was standing next to me. 

I knew you as my dad. I knew your rules. I knew your voice. I knew the look you gave me when you already knew exactly what I was thinking. I knew what it felt like to have you there.

But I never got to know you as an adult. I never got to sit across from you as a grown woman and learn who you were beyond being Dad. That is one of the losses I understand now. I never could have understood it at 19.

People still tell me how funny you were. What a comedian you were. How you could take over a room and turn an ordinary night into a story people would tell for years. Even now, people smile before they finish saying your name.

I wonder all the time what we would have been like now. Would we have had the same sense of humor? Would we have driven each other crazy? Probably. Would you have teased me relentlessly? Definitely. 

Would we have become friends? That is the question I think about most.

Because September 11th did not only take the father I already knew. It took the man I was just becoming old enough to meet. So when people ask me who Daniel Trant was, I will make sure they know he was more than the way he died.

He was my mother’s husband. He was our father. He was Pav’s best friend.

He was funny. He was infuriating. He was loved. And he was completely irreplaceable.

You were the person we thought we would have for the rest of our lives. I spent years wishing you could come home. I know now that you cannot. So I will keep bringing you with me. Into every hearing. Every courtroom. Every fight. And every room where your name deserves to be spoken.

And I will keep bringing you back here, to Northport. 

The place where people still remember you as Danny. Where children play basketball beneath your name. Where your best friend still carries you with him. Where this town remembers the family that lost you, but also the family we were when you were still here.

Twenty-five years later, Northport still shows up. 

Dad, you should be here. You should still be coming home. And after all these years, a part of me is still waiting for you to walk through the door.

Jessica Trant currently lives in Longmeadow, Massachusetts. She is featured in the CBS documentary Daughters of 9/11, premiering tonight from 9 to 11pm on CBS. It will also stream on Paramount+.

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