A chalkboard in an Upper East Side firehouse still carries the weight of Sept. 11.

Twenty-five years after the 2001 attacks, a group of New York City firefighters who were stationed together on East 85th Street are still honoring nine lost colleagues by preserving the firehouse riding lists.

The firefighters began their careers at the firehouse and were assigned there on 9/11. They recently returned to the firehouse where they started, now among a shrinking number of firefighters still serving from that era.

“This is my home,” said Captain Douglas Mitchell, who has been on the job now for 27 years. “This is where I started, this is where I learned the whole job.”

ABC7 Eyewitness News in New York was there as Mitchell reunited with two other firefighters, Stephen Saucedo and Juan Rivera, who also originally worked at the firehouse on East 85th Street. All three men are still on the job today.

“I’m blessed I’m still here,” Saucedo said. “There aren’t a lot of us left, obviously.”

Rivera added, “Twenty-five years later it’s like, oh wow, you’re the old man here.”

There are about 840 firefighters left on the job today who were working on 9/11.

The men reflected on the time that has passed and the bond that has kept them in the profession.

“It’s a belonging. A camaraderie that you like to be part of, and it’s hard to let it go,” Saucedo said when asked what has kept him going.

The firefighters joked that they have grown “a lot grayer” over the years, but said their memories of Sept. 11 have not faded. They also worried another reminder of that day could be lost.

In firehouses across the country, firefighters keep chalkboard riding lists showing the names of those on duty. The lists are updated regularly.

“We change them every morning and every evening,” Mitchell said.

After the World Trade Center towers collapsed, nine firefighters from the firehouse were unaccounted for. Their names stayed on the riding list board.

“These are our people,” Capt. Mitchell said. “Nobody wanted to touch anything about them. Looking at that board made us have some hope.”

As days passed, firefighters worried the chalk-written names would not last.

“You know, this is chalk on a chalkboard; this is not going to last,” the captain said.

Conservators at the nearby Metropolitan Museum of Art later learned about the boards. They used special pins and glue to repair them, then preserved the riding list behind temperature-controlled glass.

“You’re doing something different for a good cause,” one conservator said. “You become attached to them. Even though they’re gone, they’ve been here so long I know all these guys.”

Historian Harold Holzer, who worked at the museum during the restoration, remembered what the preservation meant.

“The Roman chariot was in the same room, and the conservator just left it there, which shows you that civilizations can endure as long as we can protect their memory,” Holzer said.

For the firefighters, the preserved boards matter deeply.

“What a wonderful history it is to have it here in the firehouse where those members worked, and where they died,” said Capt. Mitchell.

The firefighters said they still think about why they survived and others did not.

“All the time. Every day. All the time.”

Many of them spent months at Ground Zero after the attacks, searching through debris.

“Time, for me, doesn’t heal all wounds,” Saucedo said. “You just learn to adapt.”

For Saucedo, the loss is also personal. His brother Gregory, also a firefighter, entered the north tower on Sept. 11 and never returned. His remains were never recovered.

“My brother and I lived together our whole life in the same house, you know?” he said. “I think I never went 25 days without seeing him, let alone 25 years.”

Saucedo said preserving the riding lists, and the memories tied to them, is now part of the job for those still here.

“We’re here to pass down that tradition,” he said. “What they taught us, instilled in us and pass it on to the next generation.”

“Sept. 11 comes around once a year for everybody else,” Saucedo said. “But for us, it’s every day.”

The nine firefighters who worked for Engine 22/Ladder 13/Battalion 10 on East 85th were Captain Walter Hynes, Firefighter Thomas Casoria, Firefighter Michael Elferis, Firefighter Thomas Hetzel, Firefighter Vincent Kane, Firefighter Martin McWilliams, Firefighter Thomas Sabella, Firefighter Gregory Stajk and Firefighter Dennis McHugh.

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