{"id":17299,"date":"2014-06-25T00:09:40","date_gmt":"2014-06-25T04:09:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/?p=17299"},"modified":"2019-12-01T01:06:29","modified_gmt":"2019-12-01T06:06:29","slug":"john-jack-slivinski-jr-32","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/?p=17299","title":{"rendered":"John “Jack” Slivinski Jr, 32"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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There\u2019s a very flattering photo of Jack Slivinski Jr. on the cover of a 2012 wall calendar produced earlier this year by a New York City-based publishing company.<\/p>\n

The calendar is called Nation\u2019s Bravest: Firefighters Unite and features a dozen professional firefighters from different U.S. cities all posing shirtless. Proceeds from calendar sales benefit selected charities in each of those cities. In Philadelphia, the money generated will go to a fund that supports the widows of firefighters who are killed in the line of\u00a0duty.<\/p>\n

Shared from : Northeast Times<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Slivinski, a Mayfair native, is Philly\u2019s representative. His broad, boyish smile easily distinguishes him in the cover photo, perhaps even more than his muscular chest and arms or his heavy-rescue gear\u00a0do.<\/p>\n

The glistening Logan Circle fountain on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway and a distant City Hall serve as a picturesque backdrop.<\/p>\n

Yet, for all the aesthetic quality of that cover shot, it\u2019s only two-dimensional. Jack\u2019s parents\u200a\u2014\u200aJack Sr. and Gerry Slivinski\u200a\u2014\u200acan\u2019t help but recognize the irony in that, in light of the controversy that first swelled then burst over his participation in the\u00a0project.<\/p>\n

But regardless how the general public and perhaps even some in the Philadelphia Fire Department viewed Jack Jr., he was very much a living, breathing and feeling person. It was this three-dimensional Jack Slivinski Jr. who took his own life in June, just weeks after his 32nd birthday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know he was working hard. I know he believed in the calendar. I know he was under duress with the calendar,\u201d Gerry Slivinski said. \u201c(The controversy) rocked him. It rocked him to the\u00a0core.\u201d<\/p>\n

A number of issues weighed on Slivinski, according to his parents. As a young firefighter some eight years ago, Slivinski and a colleague got trapped in a house fire in Logan. Their supervisor, Lt. Derrick Harvey, rescued them, but lost his own life in the process. He was\u00a045.<\/p>\n

About five years ago, Slivinski married his wife Carla. They had no children and eventually separated.<\/p>\n

According to Gerry Slivinski, her son was trying to reconcile with his wife when the calendar project developed and thrust him into an unexpected spotlight for unwanted\u00a0reasons.<\/p>\n

In April, Fire Commissioner Lloyd Ayers learned of the shirtless photos and transferred Slivinski out of his beloved assignment with Rescue 1, the fire department\u2019s specially trained heavy-rescue unit. Slivinski\u2019s father, who is also a firefighter, spent many of his 35 years on the job working in the same\u00a0unit.<\/p>\n

In explaining the disciplinary move to the news media, Ayers said that Slivinski failed to get official permission to appear in the calendar and that the project sold \u201csex\u201d as opposed to \u201csafety.\u201d Amid public criticism, the department later reinstated Slivinski. But by that time the always-smiling firefighter had begun taking anti-depressant medications, his mom\u00a0said.<\/p>\n

Slivinski\u2019s parents don\u2019t claim to know why their son took his life. But they do understand a lot about what was affecting him at the\u00a0time.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow do you know what degree it affects a person? You don\u2019t,\u201d Gerry Slivinski said. \u201cI know what he told me. I know what I saw. I know what was on the news. I know he was never in trouble\u00a0before.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2022\u2022\u2022<\/p>\n

If nothing else, young Jack Slivinski wanted to be like his father\u200a\u2014\u200ajust like him, in\u00a0fact.<\/p>\n

Jack Sr. and Gerry met in Wildwood when they were teenagers and were engaged as sophomores in high school, he at Father Judge and she at Roxborough High. They wed right after graduation in\u00a01974.<\/p>\n

Jack Sr. initially worked as a chemical analyst at Rohm and Haas. But he always wanted to be a firefighter. So in 1976, he took a pay cut and joined the department while also serving in the U.S. Marine Corps reserves.<\/p>\n

Gerry Slivinski had her own specific\u00a0plans.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always knew I wanted to have two healthy children and I was happy,\u201d she\u00a0said.<\/p>\n

Daughter Jennifer was born in 1977. Jack Jr. arrived in 1979. They attended St. Timothy Parish School and were altar\u00a0servers.<\/p>\n

Following in his father\u2019s footsteps, Jack Jr. attended Father Judge. He played lacrosse and graduated in 1997. He then served four years on active duty in the Marine\u00a0Corps.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s where he got his training. He was in nuclear, biological and chemical warfare,\u201d Gerry Slivinski said.<\/p>\n

Jack Jr. knew that his specialty in the Marines would help him a lot in achieving his ultimate career objective, working as a firefighter in Philadelphia\u2019s Rescue 1. When his father left the unit to join Engine 36 and Ladder 20 at Frankford and Hartel avenues in Holmesburg, Jack Jr. filled his boots. Son also slept in his father\u2019s old firehouse bunk.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe really admired his father. He really looked up to his father, as he should,\u201d Gerry Slivinski said. \u201cAnd he was never in any trouble except for this thing with the (calendar).\u201d<\/p>\n

Jack Jr. wasn\u2019t the greatest student, but he was \u201cstreet smart\u201d and studied hard, his mom said. In addition, he always lighted up the room with his infectious personality.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe always had a smile on his face. And when he went into the Marine Corps, they tried to take it off but they couldn\u2019t,\u201d Gerry Slivinski said. \u201cYou\u2019d sit with him for five minutes and you\u2019d realize he was for real\u200a\u2014\u200ajust a good\u00a0guy.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy son was a combination of us. My husband is strong and my son was strong. And my son was more outgoing, like\u00a0myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

He became quite the physical specimen, too, mainly because of the type of work he did and also because he liked to stay in\u00a0shape.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe always took care of himself. If he felt he was putting on too much weight, he would just stop eating the junk and get right back into shape,\u201d Gerry Slivinski said. \u201cHe knew the rescue (unit) required that he be in shape, and he made sure he\u00a0was.\u201d<\/p>\n

He was a slam-dunk for the shirtless calendar.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u2022\u2022<\/p>\n

The person behind the project, Katherine Kostreva of On Point Publishing, has said that Slivinski was her choice for the cover before his untimely death. After his death, the Slivinski family insisted that he remain part of the calendar.<\/p>\n

Gerry Slivinski is certain that her son\u2019s participation in the project garnered it a ton of extra publicity and with it a lot more earning potential. Jack Jr. was the only guy punished by his own department for participating in the calendar.<\/p>\n

Ayers\u2019 disciplinary action drew national headlines.<\/p>\n

Jack Jr. refused to back\u00a0down.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe decided to do the calendar and he did it. He wanted to support the widows and he did it,\u201d Gerry Slivinski said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not just beefcake, because of what they\u2019re doing for the community. And if you see all the other guys, they\u2019re in front of their firehouses and they have their captains or chiefs around\u00a0them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jack Jr. got no such\u00a0support.<\/p>\n

Before posing for the pictures and sitting for an accompanying Web site interview, he consulted with officials from his union, Local 22 of the International Association of Fire Fighters. But nobody thought to run it by the commissioner\u2019s office. They didn\u2019t think they had\u00a0to.<\/p>\n

His pictures weren\u2019t taken in a firehouse. There\u2019s no heavy equipment in them. Nothing in the pictures says \u201cPhiladelphia Fire Department.\u201d Simply, he\u2019s a firefighter from Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

After transferring Slivinski, Ayers reportedly told the Daily News that the department has long been opposed to members posing for \u201cbeefcake calendars.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t sell sex, we sell safety,\u201d Ayers said, according to the newspaper. \u201cThat\u2019s been our mantra for the longest\u00a0time.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe get letters from children. They look up to us. We cannot allow them to be showing nipples in photographs of Philadelphia firefighters.\u201d<\/p>\n

Slivinski\u2019s parents say that Ayers\u2019 justification rings hollow when you consider some of his own extracurricular activities.<\/p>\n

Primarily, they point to a videotaped promotion he did for a North Philadelphia book and music store, Black and Nobel. The video was uploaded to YouTube in March 2010 and remains publicly accessible.<\/p>\n

In it, Ayers is seen wearing his fire department uniform and espousing the merits of the store \u201cfor all of my intellectual sources, whether it\u2019s video, tapes, music (or) a book that I have to have. It\u2019s here and we need to make sure that we support Black and Nobel. That\u2019s what it\u2019s all\u00a0about.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is not known if Ayers received compensation for the endorsement.<\/p>\n

Gerry Slivinski claims that the store sells adult-themed and sexually explicit material that she argues Ayers should not be promoting, particularly within context of his position in the fire department.<\/p>\n

Content posted by the store on its own Web forum seems to support her claims. One concert video shows a man performing a song called \u201cSuck it or Not,\u201d with lyrics in which he graphically describes his genitals. Another video shows an author promoting her book,\u00a0A Woman Scorned: Revenge Served Sexy<\/em>. The cover features a scantily clad woman holding a large kitchen\u00a0knife.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow can you say my son is selling sex when the commissioner is selling that?\u201d Gerry Slivinski said. \u201cMaybe the videos weren\u2019t X-rated, but they\u2019re still selling\u00a0sex.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ayers did not respond to requests for comment as the\u00a0Times<\/em>\u00a0went to\u00a0press.<\/p>\n

\u2022\u2022\u2022<\/p>\n

Both Gerry Slivinski and her firefighter husband think Ayers should resign or be relieved by Mayor Michael\u00a0Nutter.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you say to your men, \u2018I don\u2019t want you to do this,\u2019 that\u2019s OK. But you have to be fair,\u201d Gerry Slivinski said. \u201cYou\u2019re dealing with men who will put their life on the line, but you have to earn their respect.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re united in the fact that this shouldn\u2019t have happened,\u201d Jack Slivinski Sr. said. \u201cI don\u2019t like the way he treated my son and the double-standard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, they continue to struggle with questions, uncertainty and emptiness.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was his own person and he was very loved,\u201d Gerry Slivinski said. \u201cHe didn\u2019t need to live up to everything, but he did and he succeeded and I was proud of him.\u201d\u00a0\u2022\u2022<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

FIREFIGHTER COMMITS SUICIDE-Another Tragic Reminder Of The Sensitive Issues Related To Mental health And Well Being<\/a><\/h6>\n
Firefighter PTSD, Depression and Suicide — Helping the Helpers<\/a><\/h6>\n
Add your loved one to the wall<\/a><\/h6>\n
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There\u2019s a very flattering photo of Jack Slivinski Jr. on the cover of a 2012 wall calendar produced earlier this year by a New York City-based publishing company. The calendar is called Nation\u2019s Bravest: Firefighters Unite and features a dozen professional firefighters from different U.S. cities all posing shirtless. Proceeds …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17301,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-memorial-wall"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17299\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lutzlivetotell.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}