Since signing up for Project 2,996; an online one-at-a-time ‘blog’ tribute to each victim of the 09/11/01 attacks, a few weeks ago, I have been pondering what I’d write about the person I was “assigned” to blog about. Timothy Aaron Haviland, a computer programmer and software designer who worked with Marsh & McLennan Cos. Inc.
I’ve googled his name, I’ve checked out the accounts of his amazing life, and I’ve stared at the photograph, wondering exactly what kind of man he was. All of that left me still wondering what to write. Without knowing him personally, it was difficult to find anything that would seem appropriate to write in tribute to him. Rather than go that route, I chose to let the others who knew him cover those bases for me.
From the tribute printed in the New York Times in 2001:
“Titanic” was just hitting theaters when Timothy A. Haviland earned a promotion from computer programmer to project manager at Marsh & McLennan, a jump that took him from an office on the Avenue of the Americas in Midtown to the 96th floor of 1 World Trade Center.
Just like Jack, the movie’s hero, Mr. Haviland thought that he had it all. “After his first day, he was jumping around the house saying, `This is New York! I’m king of the world!’ ” said his wife, Amy L. Haviland. “This man, you couldn’t get the smile off his face when his position moved to the World Trade Center.”
Mr. Haviland, 41, met the future Mrs. Haviland online almost five years ago. They hit it off immediately but had one big problem: he was in St. Paul, Minn., and she was on Long Island. He decided to visit. She said their love affair began in the baggage claim area at La Guardia Airport and led to a wedding two years ago. It was a four-ring ceremony: one each for the bride and groom and a ring for each of Mrs. Haviland’s children, Nicholas, 14, and Jesse, 12.
Mrs. Haviland’s brother, Robert W. Spear Jr., a firefighter, also died in the attack.
Profile published in THE NEW YORK TIMES on November 30, 2001.
The particularly poignant Newsday.com listing:
Amy Haviland didn’t meet her husband, Timothy, at a social gathering or through friends. The Internet brought them together. The two exchanged pictures and kind words through a matchmaking Web site. She lived in Oceanside; he lived in the Twin Cities.
“We talked online for months. … I never thought anything would come of it because of distance,” she said, adding it was destiny that brought them together.
Amy last saw her 41-year-old husband, an assistant vice president and project manager for insurance brokerage Marsh McLennan, at their Oceanside home, drinking coffee with Hershey’s kisses and checking his e-mail before going to work at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11.
Timothy Haviland was born in Bar Harbor, Maine, in 1960, and his family moved to Ames, Iowa, when he was 2. He graduated from Ames High School in 1978 and relocated to the Twin Cities in Minnesota to attend college. Haviland’s first job after graduation was with Lawson Computer Associates, a software firm in St. Paul. Starting in the mailroom, Haviland worked his way up through the company for 12 years.
In August 1996, Haviland arranged to meet his future wife for the first time at LaGuardia Airport, Amy said. She was awestruck when she first saw Timothy. “He was really, really tall,” she said. He was 6-foot-4; she is 5-foot-6.
The two were married two years later, and Timothy moved to Oceanside with Amy and her two children, Nicholas, 14, and Jesse Kemp, 12.
Haviland was known for the way he laughed. “We would be in bed. Timothy would be downstairs guffawing at ‘Saturday Night Live.’ He would wake us up,” his father, Doug, said. Amy said her husband’s laugh was so hearty that he would often roll in bed.
Besides his father and his wife, Haviland is survived by his mother, Betty, of Ames, Iowa; brothers Bruce, of Minnesota, David, of Stockholm, Andrew, of Islamabad, Pakistan, Stephen, of Des Moines, and Mark, of Minnesota; and sisters Margaret Haviland, of Minnesota, and Susan Haviland, of Manhattan.
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Links to other 9/11/01 Information:
* See a photographic profile of all (except 92) of the victims here.
* The tribute to Timothy Aaron Haviland on tribute.com.
* The cnn.com tribute including comments from friends of the family.
