Tom Burke Memorial set for September 3rd
The family of Tom Burke is holding a memorial service on Friday, September 3rd for all who want to join them in a celebration of his life.
Compass Rose Gardens will be the setting and the service will start at 1:00pm.
Tom passed away on August 21st in his home in Bodega Bay. He was 85 years old.
He and his wife Millie moved here in 1957 where he worked as a commercial fisherman for years before “retiring” to become a stainless steel welder.
His incredible generosity will be remembered by the community when he sold a parcel of land at an extremely low price to the Bodega Bay Fire District for the new firehouse that was completed in 1997.
Starting in 1991, serious discussion of a new, badly needed firehouse started, and, for a while, it seemed like it would be built near the Community Center north of town.
Even moving the Center some 400 feet back from its current spot was considered.
Many felt, however, that it would be better to have the station as close as possible to the center of town just as the old one had been.
The cost for purchasing land though was so prohibitive that it looked like that could never happen until Tom made his offer.
“He made the whole thing possible,” said current Fire Chief Sean Grinnell.
Fittingly, Tom’s house sits above the firehouse and there is a meeting room in the station named for him.
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Tommy Burke was a fine man, a pillar of the Bodega Bay community. I will miss him and I will cherish the memories I have of him.
Dear Eileen,
Although I did not know him personally, I knew about him, and his face was always familiar. Like Earl Carpenter, Paul Wedel, Hazel Mitchell, Donna Freeman, and others, he is one more gone of those who cared so much about Bodega Bay and whose contributions to our community will never be forgotten.