The new Universal Pictures’ film, “Flight 93” that opens today in theaters across the nation features California State University, Fresno alumnus Todd Morgan Beamer.

The film depicts the story of United Airlines Flight 93 that crashed in Shanksville, Penn., on Sept. 11, 2001 as part of the terrorist attacks on the U.S. that day.

Aboard Flight 93 that fateful day, Todd used an onboard telephone to call a GTE operator. He and the operator, Lisa Jefferson, together recited “The Lord’s Prayer” and the 23rd Psalm. At the end of a 13-minute conversation, Todd put down the handset, but left the line open. The last words that the operator heard were his — “God help me. Jesus help me. Are you ready guys? Let’s roll!”

Beamer, who was a physical therapy major at Fresno State in 1987 and 1988 and a walk-on with the university’s baseball team, is memorialized with a tree in the Peace Garden and on Bulldog Walkway at Fresno State, located at the Save Mart Center along with another Fresno State graduate, Otis Vincent Tolbert, Jr.. Tolbert also died on September 11 when another hijacked airplane was flown into the Pentagon where Tolbert worked for the U.S. Navy. Tolbert was a Lemoore High School graduate who played for the Bulldogs football team from 1980-83

The university honored the two with special services on the first anniversary of the attack by planting two young Canary Island pine trees, courtesy of Tree Fresno, in their memory in the Peace Garden on campus and again when the Bulldog Walkway was dedicated on Oct. 27, 2004. (See links at FresnoStateNews.com).