September 21, 2016
On September 18, 2016 the members of Bay District held our annual memorial service to pay our respects to our members who have passed away this past year. This year we also had a special service to dedicate our social hall to be named the Bob Braddock Hall. Bob was instrumental in both working on the plans when we built the new station and then running it for the past 8 years. He loved working with all the people in the community to make their weddings and reunions something special. He also worked with the families in our community that had lost a love one to have the repast(wake) there. This is one thing that has brought allot of satisfaction to our department to know that we have done a little something for the families.
Know let me regress a little bit here. We all gathered out front of the social hall at the firefighters memorial to reveal the names of our recently departed brothers. These two members were Larry Murdock and Bob Braddock. Both Larry's family and Bob's family were in attendance along with many others from different departments that knew Bob and Larry. Bob's rather large family some who live in New Jersey were in attendance along with his beautiful wife Dee and his two daughters and one son.
Bob was a life member and past President of our department and was always working to make us better. His project of putting up the community Christmas tree every year was a project he so enjoyed and he made sure we did it right. He loved to throw the switch when Santa arrived to our winter wonderland. Larry was one of our older members from the 70's who was such a big help to the department when we sold Christmas trees at the old station. Some good times that was for sure.
After the reveal of the names on the outside memorial we all went into the vestibule of the hall where we had Bob's wife Dee and the rest of the family take down the black bunting over the main doorway to the hall to see that the hall was now called the Bob Braddock Hall along with a beautiful plaque on the wall. There was not a dry eye on the family and many friends. We then all went into the hall for a wonderful lunch by Rita "B" and plenty of reminiscing about both Bob and Larry. I know that Bob and Larry were both looking down on everything and Bob was so proud of this well deserved honor.
This is one service that I wish we didn't have to have but at the same time so proud of our department for not forgetting our departed members.