Fighting Back

So this was an incredibly emotional story for me, and still is,” says Ms. Brooker, now a writer for Vanity Fair and other publications.

Besides emotion, she invested extraordinary time and effort in the story, even by the standards of long-form journalism. “I started reporting in September and I handed in my final draft in December.

“I had so many notes, my editor and I made storyboards to organize them. I had a huge outline of the story mapped out before I sat down to write. There were many drafts, many late nights, many re-writes.”

Seventeen years later, her admiration for Mr. Dunne persists. “Following Jimmy around was an indelible experience,” she says. “I have interviewed Jeff Bezos, Bill Ackman, Warren Buffett, Tim Berners-Lee (inventor of the World Wide Web) – all fascinating, but there is no one like Jimmy Dunne.”

Still, Mr. Dunne recalls what Ms. Brooker told him when they met for drinks following publication of the article. “She said, ‘Jimmy, what you did for me in terms of saying, ‘Yes,’ and being so open, do not ever do that again with another journalist.’”

Today, Sandler O’Neill is thriving, with a workforce of 318, almost double its size before the attacks. In an interview with the Brunswick Review, Mr. Dunne recalls how and why he participated in what ranks as a classic among the literature of 9/11. He also talks about a Sandler O’Neill victim who turned out to be a 9/11 hero. On a lighter note, the avid golfer reveals the makeup of his fantasy foursome.

How did the Fortune story come about?

One day Katrina and her editor came in, and they said they felt it was important to do a story showing what we were faced with day to day, and they wanted it to be an authentic story from the inside. Katrina wanted free and total access. And I remember thinking, “I got nothing to hide.” I also thought they seemed genuine about what they wanted to do, and I thought it was worth doing.

Over a period of weeks, actually months, she became well known around here. She was like an employee. If you didn’t know any better, you would have thought she was working here. She made her own decisions on who to speak with for the article. I didn’t direct that. She would meet and talk to people, and people were very open. She’s very smart, she’s engaging, she has a nice way about her, she’s interested in other people and she listens.

You never worried about what she might write?

Late one afternoon, I got a call from one of my partners asking, “How well do you know this Katrina Brooker?” At that point she’d been on the story at least a month. I said, “Not at all.”

By then, she’d been around several of our partners. “She knows a lot more about you than you think she does,” this partner said. He asked, “Have we checked her out at all?”

The answer was no. So I asked one of the young people here to find some of the things she had written, and when I looked at those stories I found that she was pretty tough on several of the people she had written about.

That was the first time I gave any thought to what she was doing. But when I thought about it, I still had the view that the article won’t be perfect, I’m not perfect, but the arc of the effort will be correct. Her questions made it clear she was a formidable person. But I didn’t worry about that. I didn’t have time to worry about that. I’d made the decision to trust her in the same way I made a lot of decisions at that moment – by the seat of my pants.

You have to understand that our temporary space was so small and so crowded that there was no alternative to total transparency. We were constantly making decisions on things little and big in a room full of people, including Katrina. In such close quarters we operated in a way that might seem rude today. Under those conditions it was the nature of the beast. If Katrina asked a question about something I didn’t want to talk about, for instance, I wouldn’t even answer. I’d just wave her off. We were in emergency mode, our focus was intense, and Katrina understood that.

Did you see the article before publication?

I did not see any part of the article before it was published. When it did come out, I read it and thought it was very good. I cringed at a few things that I’d said. But I didn’t regret saying them. I remember thinking that it was pretty authentic. She got it right, she got the moment right. She was sensitive to things, and she included a lot of different people.

About three weeks after it came out she called and asked me if I’d meet her for a drink. I said, “Absolutely.” I liked her. Everyone here liked her. To us she was like an employee. I still see her occasionally. Her husband and son went to the school that my two boys went to.

And for the first time ever, I played golf with her this summer.

Were you surprised when, after 9 /11, other Wall Street firms – including your competitors – started throwing you pieces of deals to help you get moving?

I was stunned by it. When somebody called and told me they were putting us in a deal, I couldn’t really understand at first. But I made two points to everyone at our firm. I said, “This is great, we’re appreciative, and when the tables turn, and they will turn, we’re going to respond the same way. Also, we’ll know we’re getting better when this stops.”

What is next for the firm in terms of building the franchise?

We’re expanding our client base, we’re doing a lot more with private equity funds, with fintech funds, with insurance companies and debt issuance.

Why didn’t Herman Sandler want you dealing with the media?

Herman used to say that I could make any decision on commitment taking by myself whereas another partner would need four partners to sign off. But if I were to speak to the press, I would lose a tenth of my percentage points per syllable. With good reason. I’m very direct, which may not always be understood.

When they were killed, then I had to deal with the media. And I had to change in other ways. Herman was very tough, but he had a convivial and warm exterior, whereas I could be pretty cold when it came to business. When they were both killed, I had to have a gentler hand, and I tried to do that.

When did you first hear the story of Welles Crowther, the young hero, a trader for Sandler O’Neill, who helped at least 12 people escape the South Tower before perishing when he returned to save more?

It took a while for the information to emerge that a lot of people had been saved by the same guy, a guy in a red bandana, and then for his parents to confirm with those survivors that the guy who saved them was Welles. I may have read the story in the paper when it first came out, like everyone else. I was proud, I was proud of him, I was proud of his family.

I feel like we had good people. I remember being at the funeral of one of our people when somebody said to me, “How did we get so lucky to work with all these incredible people?” And I said, “Luck had nothing to do with it. It was a painstaking process of trying to make the right decisions on people and if someone was not of our grit or our will and our humanity, we’d decide that they wouldn’t stay.”

We had a methodology to get really good people. And Welles was a Class A, Example No. 1 of that.

Each day we’re trying to come out with something different. I feel good about it. But I’ve always been sort of paranoid and nervous about it, and I still am today.

At the moment of the 9 /11 attack, you were on a golf course hoping to qualify for a tournament. What’s your golfing goal these days?

I’m going to be 62 tomorrow. This next year I’m going to get myself in the best possible condition, play in a lot more tournaments, and act like I’m 13 years old again trying to make the high school golf team. Wherever that takes me, I’ll be okay.

In golf, what is your fantasy foursome, and where would you play?

My father, Chris Quackenbush and Bobby Jones. And I’d like to play at Augusta National.

Kevin Helliker, a Pulitzer-Prize-winning journalist, is Editor in Chief of the Brunswick Review.

Photograph top: Bilgin Sasmaz/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

Photograph portrait: Mackenzie Stroh

Photograph: Spencer Platt/Getty Images