Her prayer beads testified to her ‘great faith'
Patricia Fagan, 55, worked as an insurance adjuster for Aon Corporation on the 93rd floor of the South Tower. She and her sister, Eileen, commuted together from their home in Toms River, NJ. On the bus, Pat, a devout Catholic, would pray on two sets of beads — rosary beads and St. Anthony beads. Whenever Pat misplaced something, she’d pray to St. Anthony, patron saint of lost and stolen articles. “She had this great faith that it was going to work,” says Eileen. “She would just pray continually.” Pat perished in the 9/11 attacks, and a memorial Mass was held that month. But in January 2003, Eileen received a letter from the NYPD revealing some recovered items from the WTC site. The letter listed a driver’s license, credit cards and cash — items Eileen knew had been in Pat’s purse. “I was going into New York saying, ‘Oh my God,’ I wonder if I can get her beads,” says Eileen. Sure enough, the entire purse had been recovered, including, poetically, the St. Anthony prayer beads.
IRA BLOCK/ National Geographic Society