Paolillo, John

B.C. John Paolillo, Bat.11 John Paolillo, 51, of Glen Head, was deputy chief of special operations command for the city fire department. He was killed in the north tower. There was a 15-year gap between Paolillo and his younger brother Joseph, an NYPD detective. John Paolillo, a triathlete, routinely ran 10 miles a day. Running together became a way for the brothers to discuss life’s vicissitudes. “We used to have these kind of big brotherly talks when we would go on these long runs,” Joseph Paolillo said. “I was very shy and just dealing with life’s problems, and he had been through it all so he used to give me advice on pretty much everything in life. I mean, he was a father, a brother, a friend.” He filled the same role for his sister, Sheila, three years younger. Before Paolillo married and had his own children – a boy and girl, almost 10 and 8 at the time of his death – and moved to Glen Head, the sister and brother shared a house in Brooklyn. He was like a father to the divorced mother’s two children. When her oldest son was born and ended up in intensive care, her brother was there every day. “He used to go there and hold his fingers and talk to him,” Sheila said. “That was the first time I actually saw John’s eyes fill up with water.” Their father died in 2005 – his death hastened, they believe, by losing his oldest child – and their mother has never recovered. Almost 10 years later, a huge picture of her son hangs in the front window of her Brooklyn home surrounded by candles. But there have been bright moments. The family has established a foundation that donates $2,500 in his name every year to a senior at North Shore High School. And there are more personal remembrances. John Paolillo’s remains were buried Oct. 10, 2001 – which happened to be his father’s birthday. Joseph’s wife, Josephine, was 9 months’ pregnant with their second child at the time. “My father pulled her off to the side and said in a half-joking, half-heartfelt way, ‘Today is my birthday and for the rest of my life I’m going to remember this day as the day that I buried my son.’ He smiled and said, ‘Do you think you could have this baby today? This way I could remember it as the day that my grandson was born,'” Joseph Paolillo recalled. Soon after the burial, his wife went into labor. A month to the day after his brother died, Joseph’s baby was born. It was a boy. His name is John. – Ridgely Ochs