While Rachael and Aneliesa Gilpin may not have fully understood at the time the magnitude of what happened Sept. 11, 2001, they say it is important that no one forget that day or the lives it claimed.
That's why each of the Evansville sisters created Sept. 11 memorials to display at their schools. Each memorial includes about 3,000 miniature American flags placed in the ground, one for each life lost to the terrorist attacks that shook the nation eight years ago.
"Seeing almost 3,000 flags, that makes you remember," Rachael said.
The memorials will be on display on the lawns of Gibault Catholic High School in Waterloo, where Rachael, 17, is a senior, and at Red Bud Regional Hospital, which is near St. John the Baptist Catholic School, where Aneliesa attends eighth grade.
"There are a lot of families who will never forget their family members who were in the attacks, and I don't want to people to forget who they are," Aneliesa, 13, said. "It's to say, "Hey, this happened. We can't ignore it. We've got to face it and move on and become stronger.'"
Rachael and Aneliesa were in fourth grade and kindergarten, respectively, when the attacks took place.
Rachael said she remembers being at lunch at school with her friends and getting confused about the news because teachers weren't giving students any details.
"We knew that something wasn't right," she said. Then she saw the news footage.
Aneliesa remembers strangers being in her house crowded around the television watching the events unfold. Her mother had called a group of construction workers who were working outside into their home to watch the news.
"All I thought was, 'There's something on the news and there are no kid shows on now,'" she said. "People told me what was going on but I think it took a while to understand how important and big it was."
While the events were difficult to grasp at the time, both girls said they noticed a change that day.
"It was just weird because everyone came together," Aneliesa said. "Even though none of us knew each other, we were all Americans."
"The country, we weren't political groups, we weren't races," Rachael said. "We were all Americans."
Carol Gilpin said her daughters and her husband, Anthony, have always had an interest in world events. She said the girls decided to do something to remember the victims of Sept. 11 -- an event that had global impact -- when Rachael was looking for a tradition to leave at Gibault and Aneliesa needed an outreach project, which is required of eighth-graders at her school.
"I just think it's so good that these kids are thinking of these big-picture things on their own, and that they're just so concerned about the world and they want to do things to draw attention to these things," Gilpin said.
The Gilpins said the girls' school communities were supportive of their projects. Many of the students donated a dollar in exchange for an uniform-free day to help the girls pay back the $1,000 their parents fronted to purchase the nearly 6,000 flags.
"It's monumental," St. John the Baptist Principal Kris Hill said of Aneliesa's project. "Our kids do projects each year, but nobody has ever reached out and done one the whole community can benefit from."
"We were very proud of (Rachael) that this is important enough to her and her family to help us remember that day and all those victims," Gibault Principal Russ Hart said.
To the girls, remembering is the least America can do.
"We're always being told to move on," Rachael said. "I think people don't want to remember. We do need to move forward, but we should never forget."
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