Last Alarm: The Home Stretch
Donation protected
Last Alarm: Tributes to Fallen Firefighters" started to honor fallen firefighters whose stories impacted me deeply, beginning with the one that changed my own life and that of my family; my father, William R. Murphy Jr.
His death came over 40 years ago, when I was just under 4 years old. I was inspired to begin this project on the 36th anniversary of his death while visiting the Worcester (Massachusetts) Fallen Firefighters Memorial. Their 6 firefighters were lost just 4 days before the 22nd anniversary of my dad's death. The event finally opened my eyes to how many families and firehouses are impacted by line of duty deaths. The project was refined when I visited the Massachusetts Fallen Firefighters Memorial the weekend of my 40th birthday in March 2014, only to read about 2 more Boston Firefighters being added to it on the afternoon of my 40th birthday.
My wife and I have made 2 trips to the national memorial service in Emmitsburg, Maryland and one trip to Colorado Springs for the International Association of Fire Fighters memorial service in 2015. In so doing, we exhausted our family's savings.
I still hope to travel to New York City to photograph the 9/11 Memorial, as it represents the single greatest Line Of Duty Death event in American history, and it happened during my lifetime and my experience as a Line of Duty Death survivor. Additionally, 9/11 represents a unique LODD event in that 17 years later, there are still hundreds of firefighters who are currently dying from exposure to the post 9/11 recovery site. As of this writing, over 111 firefighters have been added to the original 343 deaths, bringing the total to 520 and counting.
Travel to New York is my largest remaining expense for the project, with an additional need for a new laptop to give me the opportunity to work on layout and design of the Last Alarm photo book, which I hoped to accomplish by March 25th, 2019 in order to have it available to present to the families of Boston Fire's Lieutenant Ed Walsh, Jr. and FireFighter Mike Kennedy. While I currently have a desktop computer that many would expect would be well suited for the task, I find the majority of my spare time to accomplish this project comes off site, often during my lunch break at work or waiting for a ride home. In addition, I plan to use approximately $500 to design a Last Alarm Memorial brick in my father's memory to be placed along Emmitsburg's Project Roll Call section in memory of firefighters lost before 1980.
His death came over 40 years ago, when I was just under 4 years old. I was inspired to begin this project on the 36th anniversary of his death while visiting the Worcester (Massachusetts) Fallen Firefighters Memorial. Their 6 firefighters were lost just 4 days before the 22nd anniversary of my dad's death. The event finally opened my eyes to how many families and firehouses are impacted by line of duty deaths. The project was refined when I visited the Massachusetts Fallen Firefighters Memorial the weekend of my 40th birthday in March 2014, only to read about 2 more Boston Firefighters being added to it on the afternoon of my 40th birthday.
My wife and I have made 2 trips to the national memorial service in Emmitsburg, Maryland and one trip to Colorado Springs for the International Association of Fire Fighters memorial service in 2015. In so doing, we exhausted our family's savings.
I still hope to travel to New York City to photograph the 9/11 Memorial, as it represents the single greatest Line Of Duty Death event in American history, and it happened during my lifetime and my experience as a Line of Duty Death survivor. Additionally, 9/11 represents a unique LODD event in that 17 years later, there are still hundreds of firefighters who are currently dying from exposure to the post 9/11 recovery site. As of this writing, over 111 firefighters have been added to the original 343 deaths, bringing the total to 520 and counting.
Travel to New York is my largest remaining expense for the project, with an additional need for a new laptop to give me the opportunity to work on layout and design of the Last Alarm photo book, which I hoped to accomplish by March 25th, 2019 in order to have it available to present to the families of Boston Fire's Lieutenant Ed Walsh, Jr. and FireFighter Mike Kennedy. While I currently have a desktop computer that many would expect would be well suited for the task, I find the majority of my spare time to accomplish this project comes off site, often during my lunch break at work or waiting for a ride home. In addition, I plan to use approximately $500 to design a Last Alarm Memorial brick in my father's memory to be placed along Emmitsburg's Project Roll Call section in memory of firefighters lost before 1980.
Organizer
David Murphy
Organizer
Gorham, ME
