| Those who walk on high recall fallen co-workers
By Patrick Gerard Healy GLOBE CORRESPONDENT More than 300 ironworkers gathered on the blacktop outside Boston’s Local 7 Ironworkers headquarters under a sweltering sun. Standing in clothes dirty from a hard day’s work, they were there to dedicate a new memorial for their fallen brothers. Originally intended to honor Christopher MacInnis, who fell to his death in March of last year at a construction site at Massachusetts General Hospital, the monument has come to have wider meaning. MacInnis, who was just 30, raised awareness of the risks of the trade, an awareness the workers and their families hope will continue to hit home each time anyone sees the monument. The structure, which stands more than 20 feet high, is composed of two upright steel members cradling the fallen third, resting at a 45-degre angle, halfway between horizontal and vertical. Having ''fallen,'' the middle beam is supported and wedged between the two uprights, said monument architect Donald Tellalian at the dedication June 23. "Through their support, the fallen member is to be resurrected to its place," Tellalian said. The structure will oxidize during the next three years, developing a permanent weatherproof patina. "Thus the weathering steel will weep rust, carried in rivulets into the earth," he said, indicating that the rust will serve as a symbol of the tears of mourning. In thanking Tellalian, Jim Coyle, business manager for Local 7 said the memorial "captures the frailness of human life." The memorial came about as a gift from the Local 7 apprentice class of 2003. Each year the apprentice class dedicates a different gift to the community, but this is the first time that the apprentices' gift served as a formal recognition of those who died in the line of duty. Ironworker Brad Sonia, who had been a good friend of MacInnis as well as an apprentice to him at Boston Steel, took up a collection to finance the memorial. When Bernie MacInnis, Christopher's father and the head of Boston Steel, heard about it, he insisted that the memorial's dedication not be limited to his son. ''It's just something ironworkers do for each other," he said. "We're a close-knit family, and when the apprentices raised money to make a memorial for our son, my wife and I decided it should be for all the ironworkers that have been killed. It's something that's going to be there forever." The elder MacInnis's own father and grandfather were both ironworkers. Bernie was present on the construction site when his youngest son fell, as was an older son Mike, who also worked for Boston Steel. At the dedication Coyle spoke of becoming aware of the occupational hazards of ironworkers when he was a boy, though he sometimes loses sight of them now. Hopefully the monument will change that, he said. "It should stand as a reminder of the commitment we all need to make to each other to ensure a safe workplace for those who come along behind us," said Coyle. The ironworkers of Local 7 deal with the acceptance of this danger in different ways. "If you think about it too much you're going to get hurt," said Local 7 member Ernie Smith. Mike Cohen, another Local 7 worker, said he turns to his faith every day he goes to work. "When I wake up in the morning, I say a prayer and I'm good to go," he said. |
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