wsfd44
09-20-2005, 09:58 AM
Forwarded from "The Secret List"
I REALLY hate scum.
----Original Message-----
From: BillyG [mailto:thesecretlist@firefighterclosecalls.com]
Subject: Cowards Steal FDNY Hero's Plaque (The Secret list)
Hey....
FDNY LT. David Fontana's memorial plaque that was placed in front of his former Brooklyn home has been stolen. Dave was assigned to Squad Co. 1, an active member of the FDNY Fire Bell Club, was murdered on September 11, 2001 at the World Trade Center.
You also may recognize the Fontana name as Dave's Widow, Marian-just wrote an excellent book called "A Widows Walk" and was also recently interviewed on "Through The Smoke" on Firehouse.com radio. An article describing the theft is below. Keep your eyes out for the plaque on sites such as e-bay etc...you never know. No need to respond to this e-mail but please do forward this to as many firefighter/fire buff sites and e-mail groups as possible. Thanks, BillyG The Secret List 9-19-05 www.FirefighterCloseCalls.com
Cowards insult a hero-FDNY Bravest's 9/11 memorial plaque stolen in Brooklyn
BY TRACY CONNOR and NICOLE BODE
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS 9-19-05
Aidan Fontana (r.) visits dad's image on Brooklyn Wall of Remembrance in Coney Island.
Neighbors (above, l.-r.) Kevin O'Connell, Bill Tucker, Sarah Greene and Sally O'Connell at Park Slope tree where plaque for Firefighter Dave Fontana is gone.
Twisted pranksters ripped off a memorial plaque for fallen 9/11 Firefighter Dave Fontana from outside his old Brooklyn home - on the day after the fourth anniversary of his death.
"They took Daddy's plaque?" a heartbroken Aidan Fontana, 9, asked his mother, Marian, at their new home in Staten Island. "Why?"
The 9-inch-by-12-inch bronze plaque - dedicated Dec. 22, 2002, to the Squad 1 hero - had lain alongside the base of a tree in front of his former Park Slope brownstone.
The simple message read, "In memory of Firefighter Dave Fontana, 1-0/17/63 - 9/11/01. Beloved husband, father, neighbor, artist, hero."
Its only anchor was a foot-long metal spike, as no one imagined it would be a target for thieves in the generally crime-free neighborhood, which is also home to Fontana's firehouse.
But sometime between 1:15 p.m. and 3:15 p.m. on Sept. 12, the well-tended memorial disappeared.
"I'd like to believe that people aren't that cruel, and that it was just a stupid prank," said Marian Fontana, who got the troubling news while speaking about her new book, "A Widow's Walk," at the New York Academy of Sciences.
"Why anyone would want to take something like that is beyond my comprehension," she said yesterday.
Fontana added that she had just visited the plaque on the solemn anniversary of the terror attacks.
After attending Mass with other widows and firefighters at her late husband's firehouse, Fontana went to the spot where he proposed to her in Prospect Park and to their former home to pause at the plaque.
Fontana said she was disturbed by the theft - and urged whoever stole the plaque to "just put it back where it belongs."
Dave Fontana was an avid sculptor who originally signed up for the Fire Department to make time for his art.
He had even worked a 24-hour shift into the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, so he could meet Marian for a private viewing of the Whitney Museum's sculpture garden on their eighth wedding anniversary.
The friends who designed and created the plaque - former neighbor Sarah Greene and former landlords Sally and Kevin O'Connell - have plastered the area with flyers offering a $100 reward for its safe return. But if necessary, they are already prepared to buy another one at a cost of nearly $1,000.
"It just makes us feel that all the goodwill that we all felt after 9/11 gets tossed out in a bucket," Greene said of the theft. "We're just incredulous that anyone could be so selfish or so uncaring."
I REALLY hate scum.
----Original Message-----
From: BillyG [mailto:thesecretlist@firefighterclosecalls.com]
Subject: Cowards Steal FDNY Hero's Plaque (The Secret list)
Hey....
FDNY LT. David Fontana's memorial plaque that was placed in front of his former Brooklyn home has been stolen. Dave was assigned to Squad Co. 1, an active member of the FDNY Fire Bell Club, was murdered on September 11, 2001 at the World Trade Center.
You also may recognize the Fontana name as Dave's Widow, Marian-just wrote an excellent book called "A Widows Walk" and was also recently interviewed on "Through The Smoke" on Firehouse.com radio. An article describing the theft is below. Keep your eyes out for the plaque on sites such as e-bay etc...you never know. No need to respond to this e-mail but please do forward this to as many firefighter/fire buff sites and e-mail groups as possible. Thanks, BillyG The Secret List 9-19-05 www.FirefighterCloseCalls.com
Cowards insult a hero-FDNY Bravest's 9/11 memorial plaque stolen in Brooklyn
BY TRACY CONNOR and NICOLE BODE
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS 9-19-05
Aidan Fontana (r.) visits dad's image on Brooklyn Wall of Remembrance in Coney Island.
Neighbors (above, l.-r.) Kevin O'Connell, Bill Tucker, Sarah Greene and Sally O'Connell at Park Slope tree where plaque for Firefighter Dave Fontana is gone.
Twisted pranksters ripped off a memorial plaque for fallen 9/11 Firefighter Dave Fontana from outside his old Brooklyn home - on the day after the fourth anniversary of his death.
"They took Daddy's plaque?" a heartbroken Aidan Fontana, 9, asked his mother, Marian, at their new home in Staten Island. "Why?"
The 9-inch-by-12-inch bronze plaque - dedicated Dec. 22, 2002, to the Squad 1 hero - had lain alongside the base of a tree in front of his former Park Slope brownstone.
The simple message read, "In memory of Firefighter Dave Fontana, 1-0/17/63 - 9/11/01. Beloved husband, father, neighbor, artist, hero."
Its only anchor was a foot-long metal spike, as no one imagined it would be a target for thieves in the generally crime-free neighborhood, which is also home to Fontana's firehouse.
But sometime between 1:15 p.m. and 3:15 p.m. on Sept. 12, the well-tended memorial disappeared.
"I'd like to believe that people aren't that cruel, and that it was just a stupid prank," said Marian Fontana, who got the troubling news while speaking about her new book, "A Widow's Walk," at the New York Academy of Sciences.
"Why anyone would want to take something like that is beyond my comprehension," she said yesterday.
Fontana added that she had just visited the plaque on the solemn anniversary of the terror attacks.
After attending Mass with other widows and firefighters at her late husband's firehouse, Fontana went to the spot where he proposed to her in Prospect Park and to their former home to pause at the plaque.
Fontana said she was disturbed by the theft - and urged whoever stole the plaque to "just put it back where it belongs."
Dave Fontana was an avid sculptor who originally signed up for the Fire Department to make time for his art.
He had even worked a 24-hour shift into the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, so he could meet Marian for a private viewing of the Whitney Museum's sculpture garden on their eighth wedding anniversary.
The friends who designed and created the plaque - former neighbor Sarah Greene and former landlords Sally and Kevin O'Connell - have plastered the area with flyers offering a $100 reward for its safe return. But if necessary, they are already prepared to buy another one at a cost of nearly $1,000.
"It just makes us feel that all the goodwill that we all felt after 9/11 gets tossed out in a bucket," Greene said of the theft. "We're just incredulous that anyone could be so selfish or so uncaring."