Faces of Ground Zero

In a studio just blocks away from Ground Zero there is a one-of-a-kind camera, a 12-foot by 12-foot high Polaroid. It takes pictures that are 40 inches wide by 80 inches tall - larger than life-size - and yields images of striking immediacy and clarity. With this camera, longtime LIFE Magazine photographer Joe McNally, architect of some of the biggest photographic productions ever attempted, created a series of portraits of the (mostly) anonymous heroes of Ground Zero. Over the course of two weeks, more than 200 people - survivors, firemen, policemen, volunteers, doctors, nurses, widows, children - came before McNally's lens. Twenty-six of these portraits were featured in the "One Nation". This volume contains a total of 150 McNally portraits, featuring those from the travelling exhibition as well as several that have never been shown before. Also included is a foreword by Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mayor of New York City, and an essay on this historic photographic project by McNally himself.