MEN OF THE CLOTH IN CHARLESTOWN
Growing up outside Charlestown, I remember the towering presence of Father Brock. He was the chaplain at Boston City Hospital for decades when I was living my life in the South End and Lower Roxbury.
He and my mother grew up at the same time in Charlestown. I think they were about the same age too. I also knew he was part of the Greatest Generation and served in the U.S. Army reaching the rank of general, which is never an easy accomplishment. He remembered the day I was born at city hospital. He looked like a mountain of a man when I was kid. Very Irish, very tall and very Jesuit.
I remember when he was named the chief marshal one year of the Bunker Hill Day Parade. My mother had passed by then and I am sure she would have liked to see that day. I remember it quite well.
I brought up Father Brock because now I seem to remember him as I look at Father Patrick Healy and Father Dan Mahoney, whom I most recently met together at the Bunker Hill Day Parade banquet.
Two great guys whose devotion to God and man has never wavered. Both chaplains like Father Brock, too. Father Dan the longtime chief chaplain of the Boston Fire Department and Father Healy from the Old Soldiers Home in nearby Chelsea. Lately, I’ve been seeing much of him back here where his family roots are too.
I ‘m thinking, wouldn’t it be nice to name these two men of the cloth as the co-chief marshals of next year’s Bunker Hill Day Parade. God willing both these guys hang around for it. We should all start thinking positive right now. Both of these Charlestown heroes deserve their day in the sun , sunglasses mandatory for Father Healy.
Fathers Patrick Healy and Dan Mahoney.