Biography for
John Finucane
The son of Irish immigrants, John Finucane was born and raised in New York’s infamous South Bronx. After serving as a paratrooper in the 1/503rd Airborne Battle Group of the 82nd Airborne Division, John began his career as a firefighter when he was 26 years old. For two decades he fought fires in some of the toughest ghetto neighborhoods in NYC. His personal experience working in some of the busiest fire companies ever (Engine 85,Ladder 59 and Engine 46) in the South Bronx was the inspiration for his first two books, When the Bronx Burned (fiction) and The Usual (non-fiction).
In the book, John takes the true stories of New York’s Bravest who served the South Bronx communities during the late 1960s thru mid-1970s – at the height of the “arson for hire” fire era – and creates a harrowing drama that is not only historically accurate, but thrilling to read. “I wanted to remind everyone about this historic time in New York City when ghettos were being cleaned out by landlords who paid arson-for-profit gangs to literally smoke the people out of their buildings, often enough causing injury and even death to tenants and the firemen coming to rescue them,” says Finucane. “During that time, firefighters were battling not only the fires and smoke, but the politicians who seemed to turn a blind eye to our hardships. We lost many good men during that era and I wanted them to be remembered in my book for the selfless commitment they exhibited to their community and their job.”
A retired lieutenant, John is a member of FDNY’s Honor Legion and
credited with saving many lives. Early in his career, he honed his
chops as an aggressive firefighter while working in Brownsville,
Brooklyn in 1967. It was there while detailed to Squad 4 from Engine 18
in Manhattan that he developed his firefighting skills that would help
keep him safe while battling the Bronx fires for 14 years. After his
tour of duty in the Bronx where he personally lost 3 brothers while
battling slumlord arson blazes, he was promoted to lieutenant and spent
the next two years covering the Harlem community. John retired from
Engine 46 in 1987 after being injured during an arson-related fire.
John served proudly at Ground Zero doing recovery work for the victims.
He is the founder and former chairperson of the “Advocates for a 9-11
Fallen Heroes Memorial” (http://www.911fallenheroes.org/). In addition
to serving on the board of the FDNY Emerald Society for over 25-years,
Finucane also published the American Irish Newsletter, and served as
president of the American Irish Political Education Committee.
A long-time resident of Rockland, and the father of three children, John, Brian and Stephanie, Finucane currently resides with his wife Margaret in Yonkers, NY. He is presently working on his fourth novel with a firefighter theme.
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