There was a new kid in my class at Center Moriches High School, and I turned around to look at him. He gave me a big smile, and we became instant friends. Bill Mathesen had a killer record collection, and I used to hang out with him in his basement, listening to music and lifting weights. One time our backs got really itchy, and I realized he was using a piece of insulation on the bench as a pad.
I had to bring in a song for my music appreciation class at Suffolk Community College, and Bill suggested Uriah Heep. I got an A—so thanks, Bill.
It was because of Bill that I even went to college. I had no plans after graduation and was leaning toward responding to one of the many brochures that were coming to the house from the military. Bill said he was going to Suffolk to enroll in some classes and asked, “Why don’t you sign up too?” That September, I became a fully matriculated student.
After a year with fairly decent grades, my friend Mike Meyer told me he was having a blast at Oswego State and suggested that I join him. My community college credits transferred, and I found myself at Laker Hall choosing classes for the fall semester. The woman at the registrar’s office asked what my major was, and I had to admit that I hadn’t really thought of one. “Well, you better pick something,” she said.
My mind went back to the $500 scholarship my brother Michael had won from the Suffolk Life Newspaper’s Back-to-School Sweepstakes. Our grandmother had submitted entries for us at Swezey’s Department Store in Patchogue and he was the big winner. A reporter named Perry Lind came out to cover the story and took my brother to dinner. He wrote about Mike and mentioned me. Years later, standing in the Oswego gymnasium, I realized that maybe I’d like to be a reporter too.
On the day his first daughter was born, Bill penned a song about her, “Emily, I Believe in You,” writing: “As long as I have your love, I’ll never be alone. I know you will always be there for me.” Self-taught, he recorded the piano ballad for Emily to keep. It was this song and other recordings that kept music flowing through his home, where he was often found plunking away on his baby grand piano.
“I would be reading the newspaper, and he would be playing the piano,” his wife, Kathy Mathesen, recalled. “Or I would be reading a book, and he would be the background music.”
On September 11, Kathy called her husband around 8:30 a.m. for their routine morning chat. Bill was in his first month as a vice president at Euro Brokers on the 84th floor of Two World Trade Center. Fifteen minutes later, he called her back to say that One World Trade Center had been hit by an airplane. He was distraught. “There’s fire, and there are people jumping out of the window,” he told her. Too upset to continue, they hung up. The last person to hear Bill’s voice was a client in Connecticut, who was on the phone with him at 9:03 a.m. when the call was abruptly disconnected.
I’m convinced that if it weren’t for Bill Mathesen, I never would have enrolled in college that day. God only knows what would have become of me—most certainly not a news reporter working for the South Shore Press.
My high school friend was 40 years old when he died in the South Tower, leaving behind Kathy, Emily, and Jessica, along with a host of brothers, sisters, and friends who loved him.
“It was a great year meeting new friends and you were very much part of it. It was a fun, fun time and l hope our friendship doesn’t end with graduation. Your friend, Bill”—His inscription in my Yearbook, Class of ‘78
Bill Mathesen
Chess Club
J.V. Basketball
Varsity Basketball
Drama Club