25 years later, daffodil planting tradition honors 9/11 loss

In the weeks after September 11, 2001, a Dutch bulb supplier and the city of Rotterdam sent New York a million daffodil bulbs, which 10,000 volunteers planted across the five boroughs that fall. The tradition has continued for 25 years, with roughly 300,000 New Yorkers planting nearly 15 million bulbs total through the nonprofit New Yorkers for Parks' Daffodil Project.

The flowers bloom each spring in places like Harlem, where organizer Gregory Baggett has used the plantings to help revive neighborhoods scarred by vacancy and later gentrification. In 2020, daffodils around the Harriet Tubman Memorial surprised locked-down neighbors during the Covid-19 pandemic, linking two tragedies a generation apart.

This year's 25th anniversary ceremony at the 9/11 Memorial Museum was attended by former presidents Obama, Biden, Bush and Clinton, and Vice President JD Vance; President Trump attended a separate ceremony at the Pentagon. The museum's reflecting pools carry the names of the 2,983 people killed in the 2001 and 1993 World Trade Center attacks.

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