Announcing Our Fall Issue

by | Sep 10, 2026 | Culture Pop!

“But I did feel, as we worked on this one, that I was listening in on many voices whose speakers were attempting to locate themselves in what would become history before it hardened into narrative.”

One of the Last Photos of the Passengers Boarding American Airlines Flight 77 on September 11, 2001

by | Sep 10, 2026 | Yesteryear

This photograph captures passengers walking down the jetway/gate area at Washington Dulles International Airport to board American Airlines Flight 77 on the morning of September 11, 2001.

Flight 77 was a scheduled transcontinental flight from Dulles to Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) using a Boeing 757-223. Among the 58 passengers on board were three D.C. public school students, two teachers, and three National Geographic Society escorts departing on an educational trip to the Channel Islands in California.
Shortly after takeoff at 8:20 AM, five hijackers took control of the aircraft. At 9:37 AM, the plane was intentionally flown into the western side of the Pentagon in Arlington County, Virginia, killing all 64 people on board (58 passengers and 6 crew members) as well as 125 people inside the building.
The image remains one of the few surviving candid photographs taken in the terminal prior to departure.