BROCKPORT DOGGIES RFC Est. 1970

FALLEN BROTHERS

Captain Patrick Waters
Special Operations

Laid to Rest October 5, 2001

Coffee and Nerves of Steel

You knew that Patrick Waters was on duty if there was a phenomenal amount of coffee brewing in the firehouse kitchen. Captain Waters, who would have been 45 years old today, always seemed to have a cup of the stuff in his hand.

He was what firemen call "a good fireman," graceful under pressure, passionate about the job and everything it entails -- from battling flames to filing reports (his were always spelled correctly). In 1998, he was on duty at Ladder Company 106 in Queens when the India Street pier collapsed, hurling eight people into the turbulent East River. There was no time to don protective gear; Captain Waters, whose father, Patrick, taught him to swim at the Jersey shore, jumped in and kept a woman afloat until she could be hauled in safely. "That was a great day," remembered Lt. Mike Kenney, a friend, who still has a picture of Captain Waters, soaked and freezing. "Eight people went home to their families that day."

Off duty, Captain Waters coached his sons, 10 and 14, in basketball and hockey and ran their school PTA. On Sept. 11, he was at the Fire Department's medical office, having a routine physical with four firefighters from his hazardous-materials unit, when they heard about the attack. They ran out the door and over the Brooklyn Bridge to the trade center.

"I've never met anybody who loved going to work as much as he did," said his wife, Janice. The coffee was only part of it.

Profile published in THE NEW YORK TIMES on December 16, 2001.  

GEORGE MEYERS

George Meyers was struck down in his prime by a tragic accident that occurred in front of his teammates.  As captain, George led the team on a run through the woods and fields surrounding the campus.  It was a typical rainy and miserable Brockport afternoon.  During the run, the team came upon a large field and it was mentioned that perhaps this would make a new pitch since the college was angry about the rugby team destroying the fields for other athletics.  George noticed large steel poles that would make ideal goal posts and lifted one up to see how long it actually was.  It arched with the nearby high tension wires and tragically sent a fatal current down into the rain soaked ground.  Horribly, this fine young man was electrocuted in front of his teammates.  Despite emergency team efforts, George died on that day in 1984 which many will never forget.  

George was an inspiration to all Doggies that respected his aggressive and consistent style of play.  He led the campaign to recruit new Doggies of all levels and brought many talented players onto the roster.  He will always be remembered as a great leader, friend and rugby player.           

JOHN BARCLAY

Another comrade that is no longer with us whose legendary story resides in the heart of all Doggies.

Miscellaneous Quotes

"Look at a man in the midst of doubt and danger, and you will learn in his hour of adversity what he really is." --Lucretius

"Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength, mastering yourself is true power." Lao-Tzu

"The will to win compares little to the will to prepare to win".  --Coach Bear Bryant

 "Our greatest glory consists not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall."  --Confucius

"Our policy is simple: We are not going to betray our friends, reward the enemies of freedom, or permit fear and retreat to become American policies.  None of the four wars in my lifetime came about because we were too strong.  It is weakness, that invites adventurous adversaries to make mistaken judgments."  -- Ronald Reagan 

"Only the dead have seen the end of war."--Plato

"Victory is within the grasp of those who firmly reach out for it."-- The Silver Fox

It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement; and who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.--Theodore Roosevelt

"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even
though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who
neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight
that knows not victory nor defeat."  --Theodore Roosevelt 

"...And the truth, I've never known a man worth his salt who in the long run, deep down in his heart, didn't appreciate the grind, the discipline.  There is something in good men that really yearns for, needs, discipline and the harsh reality of head-to-head combat. I don't say these things because I believe in the 'brute' nature of man or that men must be brutalized to be combative.  I believe in God, and I believe in human decency.  But I firmly believe that any man's finest hour - his greatest fulfillment to all he holds dear - is that moment when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the field of battle - victorious." --Vince Lombardi

"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit." --Aristotle

"When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second. When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That's relativity." --Albert Einstein

"I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use." --Galileo

"I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn't learn something from him." --Galileo

"Two buttocks cannot avoid friction." --African proverb

"The harder you work, the harder it is to surrender."--Vince Lombardi

"Quality means doing it right when no one is looking."--Henry Ford

"The great question that has never been answered, and which I have not yet been able to answer despite my thirty years of research into the feminine soul, is: 'What does a woman want?" --Sigmund Freud

Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free. --Jim Morrison

Q: What do you call an anorexic with a yeast infection? A: A quarter-pounder with cheese --Fred Durst