The definition of Brotherhood...

[DeputyChiefGonzo]

From today's Boston Globe

[size=large]Strongest link[/size]
By Brian McGrory, Globe Columnist | August 3, 2004

BILLERICA -- The first thing anyone ever mentions about Jack Lynch is his laugh, a laugh so full that, as his friend Jim McGonagle said, "It starts in his toes," and so loud that, as Pat Fitzpatrick put it, "You can hear it on the other side of town."

Lynch was a captain in the Malden Fire Department, a great big 300-pound bear of a man who engendered the kind of respect that would cause his fire crews to follow him into a burning building and know that they'd live to joke about it. They say you could write leadership manuals based on what Jack Lynch did with his men.

Which is probably why it isn't all that surprising what happened last month on Tower Farm Road, a weekend-long event that had traffic backed up and that had stunned passersby seriously wondering whether a new reality television show had come to town.

It began a few years ago when Lynch suffered his first heart attack and then another. Two years ago, doctors found a cancerous tumor on his neck, and the surgeries and burning radiation treatments cost him his voice forever. A guy who never had a word of complaint about anyone or anything can't even swallow his own spit, and his laughter is a thing of the past.

Now just 50, he's at home living in his silent world, unable to perform the upkeep around the house that he used to like so much. It got bad enough that his wife, Susan, asked one of his colleagues at the department if he'd show their daughter's boyfriend how to replace the broken front door.

The firefighter saw that it wasn't just the door that was drafty, but the old windows. All over, things were broken, and Lynch's colleagues knew that it must have killed their former hands-on boss to see his house falling apart this way.

So a collection was taken. A few dollars turned into a few thousand. They went out and bought new windows, then some vinyl siding that Susan Lynch said she hoped to have installed someday.

And one Saturday in the middle of July, the Malden Fire Department came together on behalf of one of their own, 45 of them in all, with tool belts, sawhorses, drills, and rakes. They arrived at 7:30 a.m. and by 8 o'clock the pickup trucks and vans were parked all the way down the block. Another 35 men came the next day and stayed until the work was done.

They didn't so much fix Jack Lynch's house as rebuild it. They yanked every window out and put new ones in. They re-sided the entire building, top to bottom. They painted the trim, installed new shutters, mulched the yard, trimmed all the bushes, upgraded the electrical system.

"One guy installed a central vacuum system," McGonagle, a Malden firefighter, said, laughing. "We didn't even know he was doing it."

As McGonagle spoke yesterday, he was giving me a tour of Lynch's mocha-colored, Cape-style house, where a couple of off-duty firefighters were putting the finishing touches on a basement door in the afternoon sun. He laughed, too, as he recalled the motorists stopping to ask if this was an extreme makeover game.

At the end, they all drank cold beer and posed proudly in group pictures with Lynch, who had pulled himself up out of his easy chair to inspect the work.

"It was like I hit the lottery," Susan Lynch said yesterday. "I was overwhelmed. There were so many people here. I just walked around numb."

They say the world is a divided place these days: red states and blue states, liberals and conservatives, the haves and have-nots, two Americas. But on a weekend in July, all these proud men came together to help an ailing brother.

Jack Lynch may no longer have his health, but he's got something that no disease will ever take away, and that's friendship. And you should see his house. Those guys from Malden do great work.

Brian McGrory is a Globe columnist.

And that, people, is what this job is all about!

[ff7134]

Amen Gonzo!! That story says it all.

[RspctFrmCalgary]

Wow! Brings a tear to the eye, it does. Way to go Malden Fire Department! It never ceases to amaze me when I hear stuff like this. The definition of Brotherhood indeed!

[sconfire]

Well Done fellows! This is a true meaning of the word!

[BD6413]

Originally posted by ff7134
Amen Gonzo!! That story says it all.

I totaly agree !!!! It shows the true meaning of what this job is all about.....Helping one another

[MalahatTwo7]

WOW!!!!

A truly amazing and wonderful story. Thanks for sharing.

[CALFFBOU]

Brotherhood is when you tell your Firehouse.com
"brothers" how much the mini-me freaks you out
and they keep egging you on with his pictures.

Oh, and they even go out of their way to find
new pictures of mini-me to post in here as well.

I now have to go to therphy. Thanks brothers!

[ChiefDog]

This proves these "brothers" get it. Good Job!

It is too bad that there are many people in the world who will never get it...

[RspctFrmCalgary]

Ron, Thanks for posting that wonderful story today. It's so nice to see that in a world that has gone so crazy there are still some REALLY decent and caring individuals out there. Yes, this truly is a shining example of Brotherhood !!!!!

Jenn

[RspctFrmCalgary]

I now have to go to therphy.

I know there was an offer to start a collection for therapy, but I don't think "therphy" is covered

[FlyingKiwi]

Kia Kaha Malden FD.

Loyal Brothers.

[protomkv]

Amen Kiwi,
There are no boundaries to brotherhood.

[randell]

thanks to everyone, its stories like this that make me proud to say iam one of you.

[firenresq77]

Cap, thanks for the story. That IS the true meaning........


Jenn, I think you need to quit posting under Sheri's userID!!

[Weruj1]

Malden must be latin for "taking care of your own' ! FANTASTIC !

[L13Wife]

That is such a great story, thanks for posting it. It's too often that the bad things are printed in the news and all of the wonderful things that the brothers do OFF the job and AWAY from the news that get overshadowed. Any one of you would have been there too.

[RspctFrmCalgary]

Originally posted by firenresq77
Jenn, I think you need to quit posting under Sheri's userID!!

hehehe I post under her name by mistake too.

[firenresq77]

Originally posted by RspctFrmCalgary


hehehe I post under her name by mistake too.

What ELSE do you do under each other's names??????