Yeneneh Betru's family feeds poor every Sept. 11, by Gargi Chakrabarty (Rocky Mountain News)

Fall 2006

The Betru family keeps alive the memory of Yeneneh Betru by feeding hundreds of poor people in a church in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, every Sept. 11. Yeneneh's mother, Sara, along with relatives and neighbors, stay up the previous night, cooking Ethiopian delicacies.

His siblings - brothers Sirak and Aron and sister Ruth - fly from the United States to attend Yeneneh's memorial service.That's been the family routine the past five years. "I attend the event each year, I missed it only once - in 2003," said Sirak Betru, an engineer in Washington, D.C., who left for Addis Ababa the last week of August to attend his brother's service this year

"In our culture, we basically feed the poor so God may bless his soul." Yeneneh, 35, died, when American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon. He was returning from Ethiopia after visiting a woman with whom he The family is trying to complete Yeneneh's dream project - a clinic in Addis Ababa to provide needy families with subsidized medical treatment. Yeneneh's absence was felt at weddings, Ruth's last May and Aron's in July

"It was sad," Sirak Betru recounted. "He was the oldest, he should have been there." The two brothers, only a year apart, were very close. Both had emigrated to the United States as teenagers. Yeneneh enrolled at Cañon City's Holy Cross Abbey, then a boarding school for high school-age boys, in 1981 and lived there through 1984. Sirak joined him two years later.



 

Dr.Yeneneh Betru



Yeneneh later attended Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, where he graduated in 1988. He earned a degree in internal medicine from the University of Michigan in 1995. He was the director of medical affairs at IPC, a North Hollywood-based company that manages hospital services. Dottie Price, 50, director of clinical programs at IPC, said she has yet to erase Yeneneh's phone number from her cell or from a post-it. "There's a little bit of denial," Price said.years later.

Yeneneh Betru

1984 high school graduate of Holy Cross Abbey school in Cañon City

Occupation: Physician and director of medical affairs at IPC, a North Hollywood, Calif.-based company that manages hospital services

Family: Parents Sara and Betru in Ethiopia; brothers Sirak of Washington, D.C., and Aron of Philadelphia; sister Ruth, of Washington, D.C.

Died onboard American Airlines Flight 77 in the attack on the Pentagon Age: 35