‘He touched so many people’

Tim Willert

SOUTHWEST GLENDALE -- It’s been six weeks since Dr. Carlton Valvo and

his wife, Coletta, lost their oldest son in the terrorist attacks on the

World Trade Center.

Carlton Valvo II was working in his office on the 105th floor of the

north tower when a hijacked airliner slammed into the skyscraper Sept.

11.

“It’s been difficult to accept what’s happened,” said Valvo, a

Glendale Memorial Hospital urologist. “You expect to lose your parents,

but you don’t expect to lose your children.”

The younger Valvo, 38, was vice president in charge of international

bond trading for Cantor Fitzgerald, the country’s largest bond trader.

Cantor Fitzgerald occupied floors 101 through 105 of the north tower.

Valvo, one of 700 employees who perished, left behind a wife of nine

years and the couple’s 7-year-old daughter.

“It’s just this total empty feeling,” Coletta Valvo said. “It’s just

like there’s a large hole in my heart.

“I think about him all the time and feel his presence all the time,”

she said.

Valvo, a graduate of Flintridge Preparatory School and St. Francis

High School in La Canada Flintridge, last spoke with his parents the day

before the attacks.

He called to congratulate them on their 41st wedding anniversary.

Brandon Valvo, a 35-year-old attorney, was the first to learn that a

plane had plowed into his brother’s building on the morning of Sept. 11.

He picked up the phone and called his older sibling.

“Carl answered and said the building was filling up with smoke,”

Carlton Valvo said. “He said, ‘I don’t think we can survive.’ ”

The call was cut off.

Carlton’s parents, who were in North Lake Tahoe celebrating their

anniversary, drove to Vancouver, Canada, and caught a flight to Toronto.

They drove from Toronto to New York City, where they met their

daughter-in-law, Lori, and granddaughter, Dante. Together they combed the

hospitals and streets near ground zero for six days, looking for any sign

of their son.

“We were hoping and praying we would find him,” Carlton Valvo said.

“After two days, I started thinking that Carl had not survived.”

Valvo, according to his parents, was a popular, outgoing person who

had business contacts all over the world.

“Even though he was just 38 years, old he lived a fabulous lifetime,”

Coletta Valvo said. “He accomplished so much, and we were so proud of

him.”

Valvo, who won state and county science fairs at St. Francis, played

varsity football and was elected class treasurer. He was named to the

Society of Distinguished American High School Students.

He graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in political

science, and worked for the New York Mercantile Exchange and the Chicago

Board of Trade before joining Cantor Fitzgerald.

His wife and daughter are planning a Nov. 10 memorial service in New

York City, Coletta Valvo said.

“He touched so many people,” she said. “We found out even more so

after his passing.”