Freeport Police Department Detective Sergeant Michael Capiola, who also served as the Director of the Freeport NY Police Benevolent Association Shooting Range, made a request to the NYC Fire Department, then the custodian of the WTC site, for steel from that site to be utilized in creating a monument to WTC first responders at the shooting range.

As with many other police and fire departments, the request was granted, and in January, 2002 Capiola traveled to the WTC site where he met with Fire Commissioner Thomas Von Essen . He was given two 30’ beams and a number of smaller pieces which he was told were from the North Tower, and which he then personally transported to his home in Freeport.

The two large beams went to create the monument that is currently on display at the shooting range in Freeport; the remaining, smaller pieces of steel remained in Capiola’s sole possession until January 2017.

Sam Glen, an Iraq War Veteran and Principal in Gotham Armory, was put in touch with Capiola through a colleague at The Specialists, a well-known NYC firm that supplies weapons to the film and television industry. Glen had long sought WTC steel for the purpose of making appropriate commemorative items,  after the experience of volunteering at Ground Zero after the Towers fell in September, 2001. Capiola agreed to gift Gotham Armory some of the steel in his possession for that purpose, and on January 14, 2017 he transferred 2 pieces of the steel, weighing 160 pounds, he had obtained from the WTC site to Glen, who personally drove it to The Specialists in NYC where it was stored in a secure vault. In 2018 Capiola gifted an additional, 27 pound piece of the WTC steel in his possession to Glen/Gotham Armory. Glen also personally transported the WTC steel to the secure vault at The Specialists where it remained until May 23, 2017.