When this incident happened, site member "mack", Joe M., who has a son on the Boston Fire Dept, had roughly $10,000 worth of T-shirts made up in honor of these two Boston FF LODDs. He spent this out of his own pocket. It was his plan to drive up to Boston the next day from his home in Virginia to try and sell these shirts after the memorial service for these two firefighters. Any profits from the sales would go to a fund raiser set up for these firefighter families. I remember "mack" telling me how at times he was so busy that those buying these shirts counted out their own change. And when the day was over, every dime was accounted for. Nobody took more change than they were supposed to.
In addition to that, he visited many firehouses throughout the northeast including some FDNY. The support he received from the shirt sales was extremely well. The last I knew, at least $50,000 had been turned over to the families of Lt Eddie Walsh and FF Michael Kennedy from the sales of these shirts.
Also, the day of this fire I called "mack" to find out if his son was okay. He told me he didn't know because he hadn't heard from him. It wasn't until 6 or 7 hours later that his son got a chance to call him. He was at that fire with those two firefighters. But for all those long hours, "mack" had no idea if his son was okay or not. I learned a lesson myself that day. I learned how tough it must be to have a family member who is a firefighter, police officer, or in the military. There are no promises of returning home after they leave. Knowing what I know now, "I wouldn't be able to sleep at night worrying about them".
It takes a very special kind of person to have a family member involved in one of these kinds of jobs. For a long time I never realized that. But after this happened two years ago, "I realize it now".
