Lieutenant
Raymond Murphy
Ladder 16
Laid
to Rest
on October 5, 2001
Home
Improvement In 1981, Ray Murphy bought a Reader's Digest book
on home improvement. By 1993, he was buying a fixer-upper to
turn into his wife's dream home. "When we saw the house in 1993,
my kids and I were like, `Ray, this house is horrible,' " recalled
his wife, Linda Murphy. "He said, `No, it will be beautiful.'
And it is." "Anything he latched on to he devoured intellectually
or physically," said his brother Edward J. Murphy. "He didn't
take to school as well as anybody else but he grew up to be
the brightest person I ever met." While he loved carpentry,
his skills also helped him absorb the significant pay cut he
took when he quit being a Perrier salesman and became a New
York City firefighter. He rose to the rank of lieutenant. "We
used to kid, `If you ever won the lottery, would you quit the
Fire Department?' " his wife said. "He'd say, `Oh, no.' He loved
it." But for Firefighter Murphy, 46, and the father of two,
it wasn't just about helping others while on the job, his brother
said: "If anybody needed help, there he was in his truck, his
ladder and tools in the back." Profile published in THE NEW
YORK TIMES on February 24, 2002.
Newsday
Article