STONYCREEK, Pa. — Families, public officials and first responders streamed into the Flight 93 National Memorial as the sun broke through the fog Friday morning to observe the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Family members wore buttons of their loved ones on Flight 93 or took pictures next to their names on the wall of honor at the crash site near Shanksville.

A generation has now passed since four planes, including United Airlines Flight 93, were attacked by hijackers. And for some families, it feels like a transition from remembering the past to setting the stage for the future.

“There’s something special about this year,” said Gordon Felt, whose brother Edward Porter Felt died in the Flight 93 crash. “The push we have is the next generation handing off the story. We have to prepare the next generation while we still have this window.”

Hundreds of people came to the memorial to pay their respects Friday morning — some with a personal connection to the Flight 93 crash and some without.

As family members of the 40 passengers and crew on Flight 93 said their loved ones’ names in a somber morning ceremony, several referenced babies and grandchildren in attendance. Louis Paul Nacke III, 18, stepped up to read the name of the grandfather he never met: Louis Nacke, who lived in Monroeville as a child.

“Those feelings don’t change — the memories don’t change,” said his brother, Ken Nacke. “But seeing his grandson reading his name changed my focus a bit — to look forward.”

A 9-year-old grandson of Edward Porter Felt was also in attendance. Gordon Felt cited the work that the Friends of Flight 93 Foundation has done to train teachers in how to develop lessons about 9/11, noting that even some teachers weren’t born by Sept. 11, 2001. Forty teachers recently attended a workshop, but “you could bring 40,000,” he said. “The goal is to expand out and take the story out to the kids.”

Also looking to the future, the family of Leroy Homer Jr., the first officer and co-pilot of Flight 93, has launched a foundation to give scholarships to young pilots.

Homer had cleaned office buildings at night with his mother to raise money for flying lessons, said his older sister, Marilyn Johnson.

She reflected on the passage of 25 years in seeing the Flight 93 memorial and then reuniting every year with the families of the others on board the plane.

“We come every year — we came when it was just a chain link fence and buttons because people loved this place,” she said. “We watched the kids come here 25 years ago as babies and now they are grown, walking around.”

The 40 passengers and crew aboard the plane on 9/11 had heard about the attacks in New York City and made the decision to fight the hijackers on board to prevent further destruction. The plane crashed into the field in Shanksville just 18 minutes before it would have reached its intended target of Washington, D.C.

Much of the power of Flight 93’s story lies in what didn’t take place due to the actions of those on board, said Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, recounting a story he heard from a young reporter who interviewed Joe Biden, then a U.S. Senator, on the steps of the Capitol shortly after Flight 77 hit the Pentagon.

“We have no idea how history would have changed,” Burgum said Friday afternoon at the memorial. “If they had not taken the courage to do what they did, our world would be very different than it is today.”

The public observance began at 8:30 a.m., with a pre-recorded video by actor Gary Sinise, whose namesake foundation supports an annual gathering for Flight 93 families hosted by the Shanksville Volunteer Fire Department.

“This morning, we ask you to join the National Park Service in a spirit of reflection as we mark together the specific times that changed our nation 25 years ago,” Sinise said.

As they have every year since the attacks, bells toll at the precise minute of each plane’s impact: at 8:46 a.m, when Flight 11 crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center; at 9:03 for Flight 175, into the South Tower; at 9:37 for Flight 77, which crashed into the Pentagon; and at 10:03 for Flight 93, into the field near Shanksville.

The bells — one large bell and one smaller echo bell — were donated to the Flight 93 National Memorial from the Franciscan Center in 2002 and ring annually on Sept. 11.

Joseph Welty left Monongah, W.Va., at 5 a.m. Friday to make the drive and pay his respects.

“This is a momentous event,” he said. “You know, in our lives we remember Kennedy being killed. We remember where we were when this happened.”

Eugene Lovely came from McKees Rocks with a red, white and blue homemade sign thanking the heroes of 9/11.

Tony Units arrived from Johnstown, meeting his daughter, Chris Evans, and her friend, Lucy Casile, who came from Marshall and Indiana Township, respectively. The three volunteer to tend the Remember Me Rose Garden near the Flight 93 National Memorial.

An afternoon ceremony included remarks from Gov. Josh Shapiro, who was a young congressional staffer on Capitol Hill the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, and watched the events unfold from his office. It is not lost on him, he said, that the passengers and crew of Flight 93 prevented an attack on Washington, D.C.

“In the years since, I’ve reflected on how their bravery may have even saved my life,” he said.

“Those 40 heroes embodied the essence of our American spirit, true courage, a belief in one another and a commitment to something greater than oneself,” he said. “Their heroism inspired a nation and brought people together.”

Also open on Friday, the Visitor’s Center at the Flight 93 National Memorial provides a chronological account of what happened on board the flight through artifacts, diagrams and recorded answering machine messages.

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