“Better Angels: The Firefighters of 9/11” is 343 portraits of the firefighters who died on 9/11. Each painting is rendered in black, white and raw umber on a 6” x 4” burned block of baltic birch. Displayed in seven rows of 49 columns, the portraits span 48” by 21 feet. In 2011 and 2012, Better Angels toured to 10 U.S. cities in partnership with the National Fallen Firefighters Association, followed by extended exhibits in Colorado Springs, Springfield MA and Trinidad CO, my new home.

Better Angels also has a Facebook page, posting one firefighter portrait each day, in order by Company, along with a short anecdotal bio. I am honored to present the portraits and their accompanying short stories in book form for the 25th anniversary of that terrible day. “Better Angels: The Firefighters of 9/11” is now available in hardcover or paperback. Books can be ordered through my publisher, Genius Books. By October they will also be listed on Amazon.

I lived in New York City for 22 years, the last 17 years in the Village in sight of the World Trade Center. I was living in the mountains of Colorado on 9/11 and woke to my clock radio telling me a small plane had flown into one of the towers. Instantly a New Yorker again, I went downstairs immediately, turned on the TV and watched the second strike. Like millions around the world, I sat unmoving and in shock for the rest of the day. Around 3PM, when someone on tv said, “We think more than 300 firefighters died today,” I broke down and sobbed. They were the ones who ran into the buildings. When The New York Times published all their pictures 12 days later, I thought “someday I can do something about this.” It was almost five years before I had an image of what that something would be. That started me on a journey that has not yet ended. I knew only one firefighter when I started and have met hundreds along the way.

The title comes from Abraham Lincoln’s inaugural address when he called on the nation to heal its wounds by appealing to the better angels of our nature. For me, these 343 men and their entire profession have always represented that ideal.