BEAVER DAM, Wis. — Twenty-five years after the September 11 attacks, a new generation of students at Wayland Academy is learning about one of the school’s own — and making sure her name is not forgotten.
Ann Nicole Nelson graduated from the Beaver Dam boarding school in 1989. On Sept. 11, 2001, Nelson was working for Cantor Fitzgerald on the 104th floor of the World Trade Center’s North Tower when she was killed in the attacks. She was 30 years old.
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On Friday, students, faculty and staff gathered at Wayland to remember Nelson and the nearly 3,000 people killed on 9/11. The school held a chapel program before students walked outside and surrounded a memorial bench dedicated to Nelson for a moment of silence.
Among them was freshman Sofia Adhikri, a recipient of the Ann Nicole Nelson Scholarship.
Adhikri was born years after the attacks, but she said learning about Nelson has made a piece of history she never experienced feel personal.
“I tried putting myself in her shoes and I just really paid attention to the silence, which I really never do, and I just felt each individual second,” Adhikri said.
A student learning the story of the woman whose name is on her scholarship
Adhikri said she did not initially know who Nelson was when she learned she had received the scholarship.
She began researching her.
What she found transformed the scholarship from financial support into something more personal.
Nelson had once been a student walking the same Wayland campus. She graduated near the top of her class, helped edit the school yearbook and participated in tennis and skiing.
She later attended Carleton College, earning a degree in economics and political science. Her life after school included studying abroad, traveling and pursuing a career in finance.
Adhikri said receiving a scholarship bearing Nelson’s name now comes with a sense of responsibility.
“Just making sure people don't forget about her and always um remembering her and making sure people also remember her because she did do a lot too on this community and I hope I can pursue that,” Adhikri said.
For Adhikri, that means carrying Nelson’s story through her own four years at Wayland.
“I will strive throughout my next 4 years to make sure that she will remain a strong figure in this community,” she said.
An unfinished list of dreams
Nelson’s family learned even more about her hopes for the future after her death.
They discovered a computer file she had titled “The Top 100” — a list of things Nelson wanted to accomplish in her lifetime.
Only 37 entries had been started.
The goals ranged from the adventurous to the deeply personal: learn a foreign language, visit Nepal, climb Kilimanjaro, kayak, volunteer for charity, spend more time with family and helicopter-ski with her father.
Other goals were simple reminders about the kind of person Nelson wanted to become: be a good friend, keep in touch with people she loved, be informed, keep improving and never be ashamed of who she was.
One entry simply read: “Be a person to be proud of.”
Andrea Chesley, dean of enrollment and advancement at Wayland Academy, said Nelson’s desire to keep learning is part of what still resonates with the school.
“Ultimately, being a lifelong learner and the pursuit of knowledge and and knowing that, you know, you'll never be done to me is the most inspiring thing about her legacy,” Chesley said.
Flowers from an unknown visitor
Nelson’s memory is also physically woven into the Wayland campus.
The school dedicated a memorial bench in her honor on Oct. 11, 2002, a little more than a year after the attacks.
Each year around the anniversary of 9/11, flowers appear at the bench before the school day begins.
School officials say they still do not know who leaves them.
“If they do know, they're not telling anybody,” Chesley said while describing the tradition.
Wayland also honors Nelson through the scholarship bearing her name and the Ann Nelson Memorial Champion of Character Award, which recognizes a student-athlete for leadership and character.
Making history personal 25 years later
For today’s high school students, Sept. 11, 2001 is history rather than memory.
None of Wayland’s current students were alive when the attacks happened.
Chesley said having a direct connection to someone who attended their school can help students understand the human impact behind an event often described through enormous numbers.
“For many of these students weren't alive and so it starts to feel disconnected,” Chesley said. “But when we can offer something personal, both something they can see, but also something that's Wayland specific, it can really be meaningful as a learning tool, but also to feel a part of a true legacy on this campus.”
During Friday’s chapel, English Department Chair James Cleary challenged students to think about those killed on 9/11 not simply as part of a death toll, but as individual people whose families, dreams and futures were suddenly taken away.
For Wayland, Nelson provides that individual connection.
She was not simply one of nearly 3,000 people killed that day.
She was a daughter, sister, friend, traveler, student and former classmate.
Twenty-five years after her death, Chesley said the way Nelson lived can offer a lesson beyond the history of 9/11.
“I hope that it is an example of ways that we can remember but also move forward and change and be the best versions of ourselves that we can be and know that, you know, we may not have tomorrow and so being present and with each other and the best that we can be today is the most important thing,” Chesley said.
And now, a freshman who never knew Nelson is helping make sure another generation knows her name.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.k
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