Spouse of unfound victim dedicates life to memorial

He kissed her on his way to work 6:30 that morning and said he loved her. Monica Iken was asleep again when Michael called two hours later.

They had been married only 11 months when husband and wife spoke for the last time.

"He called and said, "Everything's fine, I'm okay,' " she said.

"I was like, "Why wouldn't you be?' "

"He said, "Are you watching TV?' and then I see this big fireball on Tower One."

Monica Iken was now wide awake at the couple's garden apartment in Riverdale, N.Y., and watching what captivated a horrified nation that morning, as the first of a series of terrorist attacks unfolded on Sept. 11, 2001.

Minutes earlier, hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 had crashed into the World Trade Center north tower at 8:46 a.m. Fiery smoke billowed from the tower.

It was far away from Pasco County, where a teenage Michael Iken came from New York to make friends and play basketball at Hudson High School. His parents didn't like the heat and went back up north, but he stayed to play ball for the Cobras.

He graduated from Hudson in 1982. He returned to New York and worked his way into a bond trader position at Euro Brokers Investment Corp.

The firm was on the 84th floor of the World Trade Center's south tower.

And United Airlines Flight 175, taken over by Islamic terrorists, was minutes away from the Manhattan skyline.

The worst terrorist attack on American soil had begun. One that would crash four hijacked airliners, collapse both World Trade Center towers in New York City and a side of the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., take an estimated 3,000 lives and months later send U.S. troops to battle on the other side of the world.

But in those first few confused moments no one yet knew the nation was at war with terror.

" "I think a commuter plane hit the (other) building,' " Michael told his wife, who struggled to comprehend what was happening.

"It wasn't registering yet," she said. "He told me to call his family and friends, to "tell them I'm fine. They told us to stay where we are, we're safe. We don't need to evacuate the building."

Neither knew that Michael Iken was living the last minutes of his life.

"I go to get the telephone book, and the next thing I see is a plane coming out of the right side of the screen," she said. "For the first time in my life I was frozen. When I saw a plane heading for Tower Two, I couldn't believe it. "No, it's not going to hit,' I told myself."

At 9:03 a.m., United Flight 175 crashed into the World Trade Center south tower between the 75th and 84th floors.

Between the first and second attack, Michael Iken had spoken to about 30 friends on the phone, reassuring them he was okay. The last person he spoke to was close friend Jeff Mogulo. On the phone, Michael told him several Euro Brokers employees stayed behind to help a distraught co-worker.

They were on the phone when United Flight 175 hit. The line died.

"I tried to dial after that, and it didn't work," Monica Iken said. "I thought maybe between the first and second planes, I thought he had the chance to get out."

They never spoke again.

The South Tower fell first at 10:05 a.m., the North Tower at 10:28 a.m.

An estimated 15,000 people made it safely out of the towers before they collapsed.

Michael Patrick Iken, 37, was not one of them.

Of the 18 workers on Michael Iken's group, only six survived.

"All day your heart's in your throat," said Monica Iken, who like thousands of bereaved New Yorkers would soon be posting fliers and photos of her husband all over city streets. "You're waiting by the phone all day, and everybody's calling. It's very difficult."

But she understands why her husband stayed behind.

"Michael was that way," she said. "He would never have run out of that building. He was calm. He was in control. He never would have overreacted. He would have walked out and helped everyone he could have on the way out.

"I can't fault him for that."

To this day, she has never found her husband.

Of the approximately 2,800 victims of the World Trade Center attacks, Michael Iken is among the estimated 1,400 whose remains have not been identified.

For the family, Monica Iken said, not having his remains is like reliving Sept. 11 all over again.

"You say goodbye to Michael one day and then he's never coming back," Monica Iken said. "It's all kind of regressed backwards. We're not even sure if we're going to get him back.

"The reality is we probably will not find him. They're having a hard time with the DNA samples, to try and distinguish these remains. They're not identifiable."

Michael Iken met Monica Reedman on Sept. 12, 1999. He proposed in December. They married in October. "I only knew him two years," Monica Iken said, "but it was the blessing of my life."

The 32-year-old former schoolteacher found a way to cope. She has thrown herself into the efforts to build a memorial to the World Trade Center victims.

In November she founded the September's Mission Foundation to make sure the voices of the victims' families would be heard in the planning and building of the memorial. She was profiled in The New Yorker in a piece about the central figures in the memorial and rebuilding effort.

She is on the family advisory board to the Lower Manhattan Development Corp., created by New York Gov. George Pataki as an arm of the Empire State Development Corp. to coordinate the memorial and rebuilding efforts.

Because she never found her husband, Monica Iken wants to make sure his last resting place is a fitting one. The organization wants the footprints of the twin towers and the areas where most of the wreckage fell to be observed above and below ground as sacred, and they want the site to be a cultural center for generations to come.

"I survive everyday with September's Mission," she said. "I get the message out that we need to do the right thing, that we need to have a beautiful memorial.

"I want to make sure when I leave they never forget the lives that were lost."

When family and friends realized Michael Iken had perished in the collapse, the mourning began days later. Michael Iken was profiled in the New York Times' famous stories about each victim. That brief dispatch ran on Sept. 18, 2001. It focused on his 37th birthday party two days earlier.

His wife served his favorites: teriyaki beef, lobster tails and key lime pie, ordered from Florida. The Ikens and friends sat on the lawn "and hung out until the wee hours," Monica Iken told the newspaper, "and counted the stars."

A memorial service for Michael Iken was held Sept. 26 in Mineola, N.Y. There was a Mass at The Lady Chapel of St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City.

"It was very moving," said John Marini, 37. The five Marini brothers grew up and played ball with Michael Iken at Hudson, and Tony, Tom, Mike, Greg and John Marini all attended his service.

"A lot of people had a lot of great things to say about Mike," John Marini said.

On Sept. 27, Monica Iken gave her husband's eulogy at St. Patrick's Cathedral. She talked about the last moment they were together, when Michael Iken woke her before work. "I love you," he told her, "have a good day."

"When I close my eyes I still see him smiling at me, telling me to have a good day on our last morning together," she said.

"I will try, Michael. Until we're together again, I will try."

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