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Obituaries: Anthony Murdick and Scott Wilson / 2 young firefighters walked the same path in life, died trying to retrieve kayaker's body
Wednesday, April 11, 2001 By Antonio Gilb, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
They led parallel lives. Anthony Murdick and Scott Wilson were Cub Scouts, Boy Scouts, Little Leaguers, Junior ROTC cadets together. They were Butler High School classmates who joined the Unionville Volunteer Fire Company as junior firefighters.
They died together Sunday night in McConnell's Mill State Park in Lawrence County. They drowned while attempting to recover the body of a 23-year-old kayaker, Neil Balcer, from the swift-flowing waters of Slippery Rock Creek.
They were 25 years old. Mr. Wilson was married and had a 6-month-old son; Mr. Murdick and his fiancee had a 1-year-old boy.
"They just seemed to be a pair," said Norma Jean Hoover, Mr. Wilson's grandmother. "They had a lot of the same interests and they developed an interest in being together."
Their deaths were the first in the line of duty in the 64-year history of the Unionville Volunteer Fire Company. Investigators still are trying to determine precisely what happened.
Mr. Wilson graduated from Butler High in 1996 and then spent two years working at the Butler Ambulance Service. Then for three years, he worked as a 911 operator. In February 1999, he took a job as the director of the ambulance authority in Wetzel County, W.Va. He returned home a few months later when he was offered an opportunity to teach at the Butler County Area Vocation-Technical School.
"He wanted to be youngest to do anything," said his mother, Sandra Wilson.
Mr. Wilson graduated from Indiana University of Pennsylvania's criminal-justice training program. He worked part time as a corrections officer.
Mr. Murdick had started work as a landscaper a few weeks ago, after being laid off by an East Butler manufacturing plant. He also worked as a structural firefighter for the VA Medical Center in Butler.
"He wanted to go into the same field as I went in," said his father, Ron Murdick, a firefighter who also works for the VA.
Mr. Murdick also was taking classes to become a code-enforcement officer.
"They were dedicated and professional family men -- not only to their personal family but to their work family," said Unionville's fire chief, Mark Lauer.
Both men had experience in similar situations, said Mike Pflugh, the assistant fire chief. He said his department has received "a few" emergency phone calls over the years involving the area where they drowned. "For one place, that's a lot."
Mr. Wilson's survivors include his parents, Eugene and Sandra; his wife, Tracy, and son, Cole; a brother, Kirk; and his grandparents, Walter and Norma Jean Hoover.
Mr. Murdick's survivors include his fiancee, Beth McCurdy, and their son, Talan; his parents, Ron and Karen; a brother, Mathew; and his grandparents, Earl and Leah Murdick and Joseph and Virginia Ditullo.
Services will be held at 11 a.m. Friday at the Thompson Miller Funeral Home in Butler. Visitation is scheduled tomorrow from 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 p.m.
Donations may be sent to the Unionville Volunteer Fire Company's Memorial Fund, care of Citizen's National Bank, 196 Clearview Circle, Butler 16001.
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