9/11: The 25 Most Powerful Photos

President George W. Bush was informed by his chief of staff Andrew Card of the attacks on the World Trade Center during a school reading event in Sarasota, Florida. Ten years later, one of the kids who was there in that class, Chantal Guerrero, told Time magazine that to this day she's grateful that Bush -- obviously profoundly upset about something that Card had told him -- maintained his composure and stayed with the students until the book ... more 

President George W. Bush was informed by his chief of staff Andrew Card of the attacks on the World Trade Center during a school reading event in Sarasota, Florida. Ten years later, one of the kids who was there in that class, Chantal Guerrero, told Time magazine that to this day she's grateful that Bush -- obviously profoundly upset about something that Card had told him -- maintained his composure and stayed with the students until the book they were reading, The Pet Goat, was finished. "I think the President was trying to keep us from finding out," Guerrero said, "so we all wouldn't freak out." Whether or not the president was trying to keep calm before a group of schoolchildren, in Paul Richards' unforgettable picture, his eyes tell the tale: here, right now, is where so much of what followed on the heels of 9/11 was put in motion. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; the hunt for Saddam and for bin Laden; the still-unknown ramifications of the sweeping and controversial Patriot Act; even, arguably, today's revolutions in the Middle East -- many of the signal events of the past decade began here, with a whisper in a tense, unprepared president's ear.

(Photo: PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

For the full photo collection, go to LIFE.com less