It’s been 20 years since a clear September morning turned into a national tragedy that led to two wars in the Middle East.

The horrors of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in New York City, Washington, D.C., and Somerset County, Pa., were met with courage by first responders and a sense of national unity that, unfortunately, has rarely been seen since.

There are college students today whose only experience of 9/11 is through history books, documentary footage and stories from those who lived through that day. Unlike everyone else who was of age then, it’s unlikely seniors in college will remember what they were doing that morning.

All of the rest of us will likely never forget.

A total of 2,997 people died at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and in a Pennsylvania field where United Airlines Flight 93 crashed. More than 25,000 others were injured — and some responders still suffer from those ailments today.

For many of these families, the loss felt on that day has never subsided, and it’s certainly renewed each year on Sept. 11 amid coverage of the anniversary of the attacks. We owe it to these families to never forget what happened that day or the sacrifices that many of their loved ones made to save others.

The Eagle’s coverage of the 20th anniversary of the attacks includes stories on school memorial events at Seneca Valley and Butler Catholic, how teachers are presenting 9/11 to those who didn’t live through it and a Cranberry 9/11 memorial, which is one of the few sites in the region that features a piece of steel from one of the World Trade Center towers.

Michael Arad, the architect who designed the memorial at Ground Zero, once told me that his inspiration for the monument’s design was the manner in which people came together as a society on that day. That spirit has been missing recently.

The legacy of 9/11 is one of heroism under great duress and the tragedy of the lives lost. But its legacy should also be to rekindle that spirit of community shared among Americans of differing opinions and walks of life in the days after it occurred.

Twenty years later, the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, still feel fresh for so many who experienced them in one way or another. Let’s continue to honor the lives lost by never forgetting and the spirit of that moment by finding common ground, rather than focusing so much on what divides us.

— NCD