PUYALLUP, Wash. (AP) -- Loggers with chain saws have sculpted wood stumps into images of New York City firefighters raising a U.S. flag over World Trade Center rubble.
``It's emotional,'' chain saw carver Bill Bruzas said Sunday. ``It's a big bunch of loggers with a tear in their eyes, basically. It's just an emotional thing.''
Working in front of crowds of fairgoers on the last day of the Puyallup Fair, carver Dave Tremko produced a 2-foot statue. Then 10 carvers joined together to try to complete a 5-foot sculpture of the same image.
The Cascade Chainsaw Sculptors Guild planned to auction off both firefighter pieces later. Proceeds from the sales were intended for the fund helping firefighters and families of the New York Fire Department.
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) -- During the Gulf War in 1990, Judge James Campbell offered to perform wedding services at no cost for military personnel.
His offer has been renewed now that the nation's military prepares to fight its new war against terrorism.
Charleen Nelson, 25, and Marine Lance Cpl. Jesse Werner, 20, were the first to tie the knot since the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington, D.C.
Nelson didn't have time to pick up a bridal bouquet, let alone wait for the spring church wedding she and Werner had planned. ``The government has other plans for him,'' she said.
``May God bless you,'' Campbell said at the conclusion of the brief ceremony Friday. Then looking into the groom's eyes, the judge said: ``And may God save you.''
Werner is on active duty but was home to attend the funeral of Nelson's older brother. His unit is scheduled to be deployed to Egypt this week.
``I have mixed emotions,'' Nelson said. ``Right now I'm happy and excited. But in two days, I won't see him again and we'll have to communicate by phone and letters.''
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Singers, actors and athletes gathered at a recording studio in Hollywood to re-record the R&B classic ``We Are Family'' to raise money for victims of this month's terrorist attacks.
``It's a relief to have something positive to do in the face of so much hatred, and to have an opportunity to try and make sure we don't go doing what's been done to us,'' singer Jackson Browne said Sunday.
The performance was produced by Nile Rodgers and organized by talk show host Montel Williams. A contingent in New York also lent their voices to the 1979 Sister Sledge song.
Williams said the song was meant to encourage unity.
``Right now, while we are all thinking about the victims of the tragedy of Sept. 11, we need to start thinking about the victims that we're going to create right here in our homeland by people who are just so ignorant, filled with hatred and fear,'' he said.
Other celebrities in attendance included singer Taylor Dayne and Los Angeles Sparks basketball star Lisa Leslie.
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) -- A man who met the captain of a plane hijacked by terrorists the day before it crashed in Pennsylvania is working to make sure the pilot's dream for his son comes true.
Rob Quillen, 35, of Lincoln, was seated next to Jason Dahl, captain of United Flight 93, on a flight from Denver to Newark, N.J. Dahl was on his way to pilot the plane he was to fly to San Francisco.
Dahl told Quillen how badly his teen-age son, Matt, who was recently diagnosed with epilepsy, wanted to go to a NASCAR race and meet driver Jeff Gordon.
Quillen, an account executive with Automated Data Processing, was scheduled to play host to a customer appreciation event in Kansas City, Kan., for the NASCAR Winston Cup Race on Sept. 30. Quillen had five extra tickets, so he offered two of them to Dahl.
When the plane landed in Newark that night, Quillen told Dahl he would send the tickets as soon as he returned to Nebraska.
Quillen later learned Dahl was piloting the hijacked plane that crashed in rural Pennsylvania.
When Quillen returned home, he sent Dahl's wife, Sandy, a letter explaining his encounter and telling her he had arranged for them to go to Kansas City.
Gordon's director of publicity also called Quillen and told him the Dahls would be VIPs at the speedway.
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