Kodak restores photos found at ground zero

After the Twin Towers fell, not much remained that was identifiable. However, thousands of photographs were picked from the rubble – pictures of children, homes and pets, mementos that once covered the desks, shelves and walls of people who worked there.

Now the photos, about 8,000 of them, have been restored by employees of Kodak, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is setting up a Web site that will allow survivors to claim them.

Beginning Jan. 18, family members of victims will be able to access the password-protected site. Surviving World Trade Center workers will get the same opportunity later this year.

“It’s just something you can hold onto and hold dear,” said Lillian Valenti, chief of the Port Authority’s Office of Medical Services. Many of the pictures were damaged in the devastation, she said, “but you can distinguish the image.”

The Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks claimed the lives of 2,749 people at Ground Zero, where 1.8 million tons of debris were removed from a 10-story pile of twisted steel and rubble from September 2001 to May 2002.

Thousands of damaged photographs of couples, loved ones, vacation trips and award ceremonies were taken to Kodak’s headquarters in Rochester, N.Y., in mid-2002 by New York City Police.

“A few were in very good shape,” said Jim Blamphin, a Kodak spokesman, noting most were not. “Some were burned, some severely. Some were water-stained. … The dust was ground into the images.”

A half-dozen technicians worked on the photos for over three months in a company lab.

“It was high-tech digital work,” said Blamphin. “We hope that what we did provides some comfort to the people who eventually receive them. There was a lot of emotion in that lab.”

The Lower Manhattan Development Corp., which is helping to chart Ground Zero’s redevelopment, will send out more than 5,000 letters this month to family members to let them know how to access the Web site.

“We’re going to be helping to get the word out to the family members,” said Joanna Rose, an LMDC spokeswoman.

Family members will be able to view the images, determine which ones may have belonged to a loved one and contact the New York Police Department to claim them.

“I think it will be upsetting; but I think, to a person, we want to have all those photos,” said Diane Horning of Scotch Plains, N.J., who lost her son, Matthew, 26, in the attack. “I don’t know what he had. I have to believe he had a picture of his fiancee, and I would love to be able to give that to her.”

Horning said she found it “disturbing” that it has taken authorities since mid-2002 to figure out a way to return the photos.

“I’m very grateful to the (Kodak) people who did this,” she said. “That was a real labor of love.”

Anthony Coscia, chairman of the Port Authority, which owns the Ground Zero site, said it took time for authorities to work out distribution arrangements with various agencies. He said officials believe it is appropriate to strictly limit access to the Web site out of respect for family members.

“The families of the victims – understandably – reach out for anything that can connect them to the people they lost,” Coscia said. “If it’s helpful to the families of the victims, it’s important.”

The photographs are expected to have a special resonance for many.

“I hope there will be something for everyone,” Horning said of the photos. “I think it will be heartbreaking.

“But at this point, we are grasping for anything we can have.”