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Ed Mahoney was always on call.
When he wasn't working as a respiratory therapist at the Nebraska Medical Center, he was doing some sort of side job for a neighbor, a friend or a family member.
“He's a jack-of-all-trades,” said his wife, Kim Mahoney, 49. “He knows and does everything for everybody. From carpeting to painting to electrical work, you name it, he does it.”
Anytime a storm hit, Ed Mahoney would be up and down his block with his chain saw clearing tree debris and helping his neighbors before most of them were even out of bed.
“He's there for everyone,” his wife said. “He's pretty selfless.”
Ed Mahoney, 54, of Omaha died Sunday from injuries suffered in a boating accident Saturday evening at a private lake near 168th Street and Nebraska Highway 36, just west of Bennington.
A vigil service will be at 7 p.m. Wednesday at St. Margaret Mary Catholic Church, with visitation starting at 5 p.m. The funeral service will be Thursday at 10:30 a.m. followed by the burial at Hillcrest Cemetery.
Kim Mahoney said her husband loved to hunt, fish, bowl and boat.
He was a longtime parishioner of St. Margaret Mary, where his wife of 28 years is a fifth-grade teacher. He had been employed at the Nebraska Medical Center for 29 years and was named the respiratory therapist of 2008.
He had four daughters: Tara Mahoney, 26, Stacie Johnson, 24, Jennifer Mahoney, 21 and Carrie Mahoney, 18. He was also a grandfather to 8-month-old Jacob Johnson Jr., daughter Stacie's son.
“Jacob just lights up when Ed comes into the room,” said Kim Mahoney. She said her husband was so excited to have a baby boy in the family. She said he gleamed whenever he talked about his grandson. That family man is what the Mahoneys will miss most.
“He was our protector in every way,” Stacie Johnson said. “He was our everything.”
Kim Mahoney said her husband “was a great provider, strong, loving, caring and a great role model.”
She said he would always insist on having family get-togethers. One of his traditions was to get his entire extended family together on Saturdays for Nebraska football games.
That's exactly what he did the day of the accident.
Kim Mahoney said her family watched the football game and celebrated a birthday at her sister-in-law's home on the lake Saturday. After the game, she said, a neighbor insisted on taking six people on a boat ride to show them his new fishing boat.
Mahoney said she had never met the driver of the boat before.
The Douglas County Sheriff's Office said Monday that the driver was 47-year-old Ken Graeber, a Husker football player during the 1982-84 seasons.
The boat was going 25 to 35 mph when it crashed into a seawall, she said. “We told him to slow down, and that's when he hit the wall.”
Authorities say the boat rammed the wall about 10 p.m.
Several people were injured, but all had been released from a hospital. Kim Mahoney's sister, Karen Bloemer, who suffered severe back injuries, was released from the hospital Monday.
Officers say the driver had been drinking alcohol. No arrest had been reported.
Kim Mahoney said she knows there will be a huge void in so many people's lives with her husband's death.
She said that when an elderly neighbor heard the news, he broke down. She said he had a list of things that her husband volunteered to do for him. The neighbor told her he couldn't live without him.
“That's how many lives he touched,” said daughter Tara Mahoney. “There are just no words we can say that are as awesome as he is.”
This report includes material from the Associated Press.
Contact the writer:
444-1336, leia.baez@owh.com
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