Marcy Borders was an American legal assistant who worked at the Bank of America located in the World Trade Center and survived its collapse, following the al-Qaeda attacks on September 11, 2001. Stan Honda, a photographer for Agence France Presse, captured an image of Borders, completely covered in dust from the building collapse, that subsequently became widely described as "iconic". The image became so well known and so widely distributed, that Borders became known as "The Dust Lady".
Personal impact
A resident of Bayonne, New Jersey, the 28-year-old Borders was working on the 81st floor inside of the North Tower at the time of the attack. Borders said that she never recovered from the trauma of the attack. A decade-long depression led to a break-up with her partner, the loss of custody of her children, and an addiction to alcohol and drugs. Borders said that a key event in her recovery and return to sobriety was learning of the death of Osama bin Laden. Borders had preserved the outfit she wore in the iconic photo.
Cultural impact
The image Honda took of Borders became iconic; she was remembered in many retrospective articles about the attacks of 9/11. The Daily Telegraph chose her as one of the survivors they profiled on the tenth anniversary of the attack. Borders had been invited to spend the tenth anniversary of 9/11 at a memorial event in Germany.
Cancer diagnosis and death
Borders was diagnosed with stomach cancer in August 2014. Borders's cancer had already saddled her with a crippling debt of $190,000—even though she had not yet received surgery and she still needed additional chemotherapy. Borders said she could not even afford to get her prescriptions filled. She believed her cancer was triggered by the toxic dust she was exposed to when the World Trade Center collapsed, having once stated, "I definitely believe it because I haven't had any illnesses. I don't have high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes." Borders died from cancer on August 24, 2015.
In fiction
Borders and Sharbat Gula are the two main characters of Pamela Booker's 2009 play Dust: Murmurs and a Play. Both Borders and Gula first became known to the public through iconic photos. Booker dedicated her play to Borders and Gula. "The Dust Lady" photo is mentioned in Julie Buxbaum's novel Hope and Other Punch Lines, about the subject of a fictional photo from 9/11.
