BY John Bayles
Hanging in Andy Jurinko’s studio in the Downtown loft he shared with his wife Pat Moore, is an unfinished oil painting of Mickey Mantle in mid-swing. A fan of Jurinko’s commissioned the work.
“It’ll never be finished now, but the person who commissioned it still wants it and is coming to pick it up,” said Moore on Tuesday morning.
The reason the work will never be completed is because Moore’s husband, whose paintings of big league baseball stadiums and legendary players hang in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, as well as in numerous private collections, passed away from pancreatic cancer on February 14.
“He died at home, surrounded by friends,” said Moore.
Moore, who is a member of Community Board 1, held what she deemed a “Quaker meeting” style memorial to celebrate her husband’s life last Saturday. She said over 150 people attended, many sharing funny and poignant stories about Jurinko. Moore said she wanted the event to be fun and quirky; her desire is indicative of how she fondly refers to her late husband’s obsession with not only baseball, but film, women and life in general.
“He was a nut job,” said Moore, “and not just about baseball.”
Walking into the loft at 125 Cedar Street, one can’t help but be struck by the library in the foyer. It is dominated by shelves upon shelves holding book after book about America’s game — a baseball enthusiast’s dream. Moore pointed to a dusty copy of a Baseball Encyclopedia, what must have been Jurinko’s equivalent to the Bible.
That book, along with the hundreds of others in the couple’s loft, might not be there today, if not for both Moore’s and Jurinko’s dedication to remaining in their apartment post-9/11. All of their windows were blown in and debris from the falling towers filled the apartment. The two spent nine months shoveling debris and restoring their home and its belongings.
“My friends thought I wouldn’t be able to save the books,” Moore recalled. “But I said, ‘Watch me.’ And I learned to vacuum a book in less than five minutes.”
The building is where Jurinko and Moore first met in 1977. It began as a building for artists-in-residence and Moore had moved in first. A fire outside of the building one night brought all of the residents out onto the street and that’s when the two met.
“Everyone was standing around and I didn’t recognize Andy. Someone told me he had just moved into the building,” said Moore.
Soon after Jurinko invited Moore to his loft to share a bottle of wine; that’s when Moore “passed the test.”
As she approached the door, she noticed hanging over the peephole a cut-out picture of “Mugsy,” a character from the old Bowery Boys series.
“I walked in and asked him what Mugsy was doing on his door,” said Moore. “At that point, it was a done deal.”
The two clicked immediately over their love of film and within months Moore moved in with Jurinko. Later, in 1991, the two would get married in Key West, Florida, by a friend who happened to be a Justice of the Peace.
Though Moore was hesitant due to the severity of Jurinko’s illness, in November of last year the two returned to Key West.
“He was in pain the entire time we were there and barely got of the bed,” recalled Moore as she stroked a locket hanging around her neck that holds a lock of Jurinko’s hair. “But he was all about revisionist history… when we returned he told everyone what a great trip he had. At least he got see it one more time.”
Andrew Floyd Jurinko was born on June 17, 1939, in Phillipsburg, New Jersey. He was one of three children of Andrew and Mae Wellen Jurinko. In addition to Moore and their cat, Jack, he is survived by his brother, Stephen, and his sister, Shirley Supp.
