09/11/2026
Gary Egan has been the general manager of Pete’s Tavern for 39 years. On September 11, 2001, he was at Pete’s as New York City shut down around him.
By late morning, 14th Street had become a cutoff point, with people being moved north from Lower Manhattan. Only a handful of Pete’s front-of-house staff had been able to make it in that morning. The cooks, who started at 7 a.m., were already there.
Pete’s opened its doors at 11.
People began arriving from downtown, some covered head to toe in gray dust. Many had fled their offices without wallets or money. Credit card processing was down. Cell phones and landlines weren’t working. Pete’s fed anyone who needed it, whether they could pay or not.
“We weren’t open to do business. We were open to provide a service. Somewhere for people to sit, eat, stop, gather their thoughts.”
Every television in the tavern was tuned to a different news channel, each with the volume turned all the way up. People desperately tried to reach their families. Mostly, Gary remembers the silence.
“Everybody looked like a zombie. Nobody spoke. Every face was blank. Nobody cried. It was too fresh. Too surreal.”
Pete’s stayed open until midnight, when there was virtually nothing left to serve. Some checks from that day were simply marked “WTC / comp.”
Gary remembers something else about September 11, too: the way New Yorkers responded to one another.
“It didn’t matter where you came from, what color your skin was, how you voted or what God you prayed to. You were a New Yorker, and you were going to help your neighbors.”
Pete’s had already survived Prohibition, blackouts and fires. On September 11, 2001, its job was simply to be there. Twenty-five years later, we remember those we lost, those who survived, and the New York that came together that day.
