It’s with a heavy heart that I announce that Joe Berkman, aka @Zirky on the forum, passed away Thursday after a 6-month battle with melanoma.
I first met Joe 4 years ago as a new reefer to be. I had posted on Boston Reefers, looking to do some tank tours to learn more about the hobby. Joe was right in my backyard (I’m in Manchester, Joe lived in Gloucester) and he was nice enough to invite me to his house, where we spent several hours while he infected me with his enthusiasm for reefing. This quickly evolved into one of the great friendships of my life. In addition to reefing, we also shared a passion for boats and boating. Joe was an experienced boatbuilder, and the former founder and owner of the Gloucester Boat Building Company, builder of the Gloucester 20.
Calling ourselves The Cape Ann Reefers Society, Joe and I would spend many many (many!) Sunday afternoons going on reefing road trips, for hours. We went on dozens of long drives, visiting most of the LFSs and coral farmers in New England. No trip was too far, no number of stops too many. We would just happily chug along, talking about reefing, boats, and whatever else was going on. We also helped each other on various projects. Well, mostly Joe helped me. He was a brilliant craftsman and tinkerer. One of our biggest projects was my 5 foot tall kalk stirrer, which is an engineering marvel.
I will miss Joe’s energy, enthusiasm, warmth, and humor. He was such a good soul. Despite many struggles with his tank, he was unfailingly upbeat. This applied to his illness as well. Even in the latter stage of his illness, after he realized that he wasn’t able to maintain his tank, he still expected to make it out the other side of his cancer. Just last week, he was talking about starting up a nano tank when he got better. Sadly, that was not to be.
RIP Joe! You will be missed.
I first met Joe 4 years ago as a new reefer to be. I had posted on Boston Reefers, looking to do some tank tours to learn more about the hobby. Joe was right in my backyard (I’m in Manchester, Joe lived in Gloucester) and he was nice enough to invite me to his house, where we spent several hours while he infected me with his enthusiasm for reefing. This quickly evolved into one of the great friendships of my life. In addition to reefing, we also shared a passion for boats and boating. Joe was an experienced boatbuilder, and the former founder and owner of the Gloucester Boat Building Company, builder of the Gloucester 20.
Calling ourselves The Cape Ann Reefers Society, Joe and I would spend many many (many!) Sunday afternoons going on reefing road trips, for hours. We went on dozens of long drives, visiting most of the LFSs and coral farmers in New England. No trip was too far, no number of stops too many. We would just happily chug along, talking about reefing, boats, and whatever else was going on. We also helped each other on various projects. Well, mostly Joe helped me. He was a brilliant craftsman and tinkerer. One of our biggest projects was my 5 foot tall kalk stirrer, which is an engineering marvel.
I will miss Joe’s energy, enthusiasm, warmth, and humor. He was such a good soul. Despite many struggles with his tank, he was unfailingly upbeat. This applied to his illness as well. Even in the latter stage of his illness, after he realized that he wasn’t able to maintain his tank, he still expected to make it out the other side of his cancer. Just last week, he was talking about starting up a nano tank when he got better. Sadly, that was not to be.
RIP Joe! You will be missed.
