When Barbara Olson died on September 11, 2001 at the age of 45, she was beautiful, audacious and courageous. The wife of the Solicitor General of the United States of America, Ted Olson, Barbara was a dancer, an author, a lawyer and a popular Washington D.C. hostess.

Barbara Olson was born in Houston, Texas in 1955. After college graduation, she danced with both the San Francisco Ballet Company and the Harkness Ballet in New York City. In order to afford law school, she took work as a television producer and eventually graduated from Benjamin Cardoza School of Law at Yeshiva University. Following graduation, Mrs. Olson worked as a prosecutor in Washington, D.C.

Her relationship with Mr. Olson brought her into contact with the television folk in D.C. and this is where most of the world knows Barbara Olson. She appeared on Larry King Live and on most of the cable news programs, including the fledgling Fox News Channel.

Mrs. Olson was the author of two enormously enlightening books “Hell to Pay: the unfolding story of Hillary Rodham Clinton” and “The Final Days” about the last months of the Clinton Presidency.

Barbara Olson had delayed her flight to Los Angeles to tape with Bill Maher in order to wake up with her husband on the morning of September 11, her husband’s birthday.

After the passengers and crew were herded to the back of the plane by the hijackers, Mrs. Olson frantically tried to get operators at the Justice Department to accept her collect calls. In today’s world, where we all use our mobile phones on the planes, it is difficult to imagine how cut off the passengers of Flight 77 to Los Angeles were. Barbara Olson finally spoke with her husband and asked him what she should tell the pilot to do.

Flight 77 crashed into the United States Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. on September 11, 2001. Mrs. Olson, along with the 63 other passengers, crew and terrorist, died in the horrific terrorist event.