NY 1

It's been eight years since Robert Wallace Jr.'s father signed him up to take the Fire Department's entrance exam. Just a year later, Wallace Sr., a fire lieutenant covering at Engine 226, was killed while responding to the World Trade Center.

Wallace Jr. is now a probationary firefighter.

"He's smiling. He's happy, you know? He's gotta be," said Wallace Jr. "He's always, he was a guy that loved his job, and I just know that this is something that he'd want me to do."

The younger Wallace was one of 274 probationary firefighters to graduate back in January after spending 23 weeks at the fire academy – the first class to spend more time training in fields like counterterrorism and building inspection.

Wallace says his time in the academy was grueling, but motivated by the memory of his father, and the many others who were lost on 9/11.

"The academy prepared you for the worst things that can happen," he said. "It gives you the skills to do the job right, not get hurt, and be safe."

Wallace says he could feel his father's presence while he was at the academy, and feels it even more so now that he's out working in the field at Engine 275.

"I talk to him in my head," said Wallace. "I say, 'dad, what do I do, what should I do?' That definitely happens."

Wallace is not the only firefighter working at Engine 275 Ladder 133 whose father was killed on 9/11. He says he has friends working all over the department whose fathers and brothers were killed at the World Trade Center, and that's why they became firefighters.

"It motivated me much more," he said. "I just wanted to do the job, and follow the family tradition."

Though he holds his spirit, his father's body was never recovered. Wallace says he hopes his brother will follow in their father's legacy and become firefighters, as well. He keeps his dad's mass card in his locker at work – a picture of a man he hopes to grow up to be like, and in many ways, a man he's already become.