Dennis Smith

Dennis Smith (courtesy of Dennis Smith)

Although he had already retired from a distinguished career as a New York City firefighter, Dennis Smith rushed to volunteer at Ground Zero on September 11th when he heard that two planes had crashed into the World Trade Center. He worked tirelessly in the days and nights that followed, and continued to participate in the recovery efforts for months afterward.

It was a single act of heroism in a life characterized by them. Smith spent many of his eighteen years as a firefighter at one of the city's busiest firehouses in the South Bronx, one of its most blighted neighborhoods. His thirteen books include the bestselling Report from Engine Co. 82,and Report from Ground Zero, which chronicles his own experiences as well as those of other rescue workers in the aftermath of 9/11. With those books, he has established himself as a powerful advocate on behalf of emergency workers, the brave men and women who took center stage on September 11th when they became icons of goodness and heroism to the world, just as the attack itself represented the purest face of evil. That advocacy has culminated in the founding of First Responders Financial, which will provide financial and insurance services exclusively to first responders and their families.