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Kershaw family sticks together after Sept. 11

By KATHLEEN McLAUGHLIN

Staff writer

MANCHESTER-BY-THE-SEA -- Everyone from local basketball fans to members of the yachting industry felt a sense of loss here when Ralph Kershaw died on United Airlines Flight 175.

But the loss was greatest on Andrews Avenue, where Kershaw and his brother grew up and then built their own homes. Hedi Kershaw, who runs Bearskin Neck Sweaters in Rockport, lives here in the house her husband built. Ralph Kershaw's mother, Elaine, still lives next door, and his brother, Alan, is still across the street.

Kershaw's twin sons, Jason and Matthew, 26, continue to work at Crocker's boatyard. Her daughter, Kristin, 28, lives in Beverly.

Even though she's surrounded by the things her husband left behind, Hedi says the loss isn't always close at hand.

"When you lose someone suddenly, your mind doesn't accept it," she says.

As Sept. 11 drew closer, however, the reminders became more frequent. The event is everywhere on television and in the newspapers. "You want the world to remember," she explains, "but it's really in your face. When you're not expecting it, it's right there."

Ralph and Hedi Kershaw had been together since their senior year of high school, where he was a basketball star. Later, he took over his father's marine survey company, work that eventually took him all over the world.

He was going to meet a client in Singapore on Sept. 11.

Kershaw was so well-known as a marine surveyor -- he inspected yachts for soundness -- that an industry magazine paid him tribute. Friends in the professional world remembered him the same way people at home did, as warm-hearted and energetic.

In Manchester, Kershaw played in and ran the men's recreational basketball league for 30 years. Whether he was building a skateboard ramp for his sons or refitting a boat for a wheelchair-bound friend, he did it in a big way.

Kershaw's family, which includes six nieces and nephews, hasn't shied away from all public remembrance. The family held a basketball tournament in June to benefit the men's league scholarship fund.

When it came to marking Sept. 11, however, Hedi Kershaw says she was confused. Should this difficult, personal anniversary be observed in public or private? At first the family planned nothing special, she says. Perhaps she and her children would just get together on their boat, "something positive."

Then she considered attending a memorial service in Boston, set up by U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy. "We may change our minds," Kershaw says.

Either way, the family will be together. "We do have a tendency to stick close together right now."