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NEW YORK (AP) -- A nation struggling to express the grief of losing thousands in airborne terror attacks will remember the first 102 minutes of that day mostly in silence, with few sounds other than bells, the roar of military jets and the recitation of victims' names.

At the World Trade Center, felled by two of the four hijacked jetliners on Sept. 11, family members and dignitaries will recite the names of the 2,801 dead and missing, beginning and ending with moments of silence and excerpts from historical speeches.

"Our intent," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said, "is to have a day of observances that are simple and powerful."

A wall etched with the names of the dead and missing was unveiled yesterday at a new Ground Zero viewing stand. From Sept. 12-14, victims' family members will be allowed to visit the wall, which will eventually extend around the perimeter of the World Trade Center site. The viewing stand will be opened to the general public on Sunday.

A ceremony at the Pentagon, where 184 people were killed, was to begin at 9:30 a.m., and include a moment of silence, the Pledge of Allegiance and music by military bands.

Thousands were to gather in the Pennsylvania field where a fourth hijacked plane crashed that morning. The ceremony at 10:06 a.m., the time of the United Airlines Flight 93 crash, includes a moment of silence and a reading of the 40 victims' names as bells are tolled.

Across the nation, ceremonies were to rely on symbolism and historical references.

"I suspect that people don't want to break into what I would call the solemnity of the day. It's almost as though too much verbiage would be inappropriate," said Mary Beth Norton, a professor of history at Cornell University.

"Wordless ceremonies or repeating things written in the past strike me as a statement that we're almost not up to commemorating an event of this magnitude properly," she said.

President Bush will visit all three disaster sites today, traveling from the Pentagon to the southwestern Pennsylvania field and, finally, to New York's Ground Zero.

Bush will address the nation tonight from Ellis Island, with another symbol -- the Statue of Liberty -- as his backdrop. He hopes it will remind "America again of our moral calling, our higher purpose as the beacon of liberty and freedom for people around the world," said White House press secretary Ari Fleischer.

The Bush administration yesterday raised the terror alert for the first time to code orange, signaling a high danger of attack. Officials said the alert was prompted by specific and credible threats to American embassies overseas.

"The city has been at orange since March when the feds announced the new coding system, so it is not changing anything here at this point," said Bloomberg spokesman Ed Skyler.

"We are not recommending that events be canceled," Attorney General John Ashcroft said. He said the government asks Americans to "mark the anniversary with heightened awareness of their environment and the activities occurring around them."

Worldwide the day before the anniversary, terror threats forced three U.S. embassies to close in Asia. Authorities throughout Europe imposed heightened security measures.

New York is one of many cities that plan a military flyover to mark the anniversary. Military helicopters will buzz Boise, Idaho; Iowa National Guard will fly over Des Moines; and F-16 fighter jets will fly over Bismarck, N.D.

Combat air patrols over New York City are likely to be the only aircraft visible from Ground Zero. A flight ban until Friday evening limits flying below 18,000 feet within a 34.5 mile-radius of the site.

The city's remembrance was to begin with a moment of silence at 8:46 a.m., when the first plane hit -- and end just before 10:30 a.m., when the second tower collapsed.

Former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani was scheduled to lead a long line of people reading the victims' names in alphabetical order. Others include Secretary of State Colin Powell, actor Robert De Niro and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. Relatives of victims who worked for companies that suffered heavy losses, such as Cantor Fitzgerald and Aon Corp., will read many names. After the first moment of silence, Gov. George Pataki will read from the Gettysburg Address. The ceremony will conclude with a reading from the Declaration of Independence by New Jersey Gov. James McGreevey.

U.S. cities thousands of miles from the crash sites will fall silent for moments in the morning and throughout the day to honor the dead. In Los Angeles, houses of worship were asked to ring bells at 5:46 a.m., followed by a moment of silence. A hush will fall over Anchorage, Alaska, broken by a fire department bell-ringing and followed by a candlelight vigil and prayer service.

Many colleges, including Yale University, Georgia Tech and the University of Cincinnati, have planned campus-wide silent observances. A public ceremony was planned at the Oklahoma City National Memorial, which marks what had been the worst act of terrorism on American soil before the trade center attacks.

In Chicago, home of the Sears Tower, the nation's tallest b uilding, residents will observe three minutes of silence before an interfaith prayer at Daley Plaza.