On the afternoon of September 10, 2001, Gerri Losquadro was playing golf with some clients when her leg suddenly collapsed, crashing her to the ground. 

“It was as though someone kneed me violently from behind,” she said. “It came out of nowhere. The pain was excruciating and had no explanation.”  

The next morning – the fateful September 11 – the pain was still so bad that she could not go to work at Marsh & McLennan which had offices in both Towers of the World Trade Center. That day, 300 of her colleagues perished when the tower fell.

“There was no credible explanation for my leg injury, so maybe – just maybe – my father was sending me a life-saving message from heaven. I love believing that.”

Gerri’s dad Henry had always played a big role in her life. In 1962, when Gerri’s family bought a new Bonneville station wagon, he first gave her a lesson in automotive “sciences.”  Then, in 1968, he made her jack it up and change all four perfectly fine tires. (Not all at once, btw.)

“That was one heavy car,” she remembers. “But he wanted me to know how to do it so I could be self-reliant and not have to depend on anyone or anything, including roadside repair.”

It was a life lesson. Gerri’s parents were formidable (as anyone who ever met her mother knows well) and they taught her self-reliance, self-respect and to make as much of life as she could. 

When Gerri retired seven years ago, she had been the first female national accounts insurance underwriter, the first female division head at the insurance mammoth AIG and then the first female Senior Vice President for Marsh & McLennan Companies.  Along the way, she was an executive at The Hartford, Zurich Insurance Group, and became managing director and member of management board and global client relationship manager of Guy Carpenter, a subsidiary of Marsh and McLennan. Today she sits on the Board of Directors of Everest Re Group Ltd.

Her story starts in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, where she was the first-born of four Losquadro kids.  They lived in the house her grandfather built and where her mother grew up. Her dad was a lineman for New York Telephone and her mother worked for American Greetings. It was an extended and close family of aunts, uncles and cousins.

She went to Ft. Hamilton High School) and then on to Stony Brook because that’s where her beloved cousin Danny went. Her first job was teaching little kids social sciences. This was not the job for her, so she turned to her uncle who said he could help her get into the insurance business.

“With all those green suits? No way,” she said, remembering the guys who sold insurance from house to house back then.

But she gave it a shot and enrolled in an insurance training class with a group of men. She was quickly passed over for an underwriting job because she was told “women can’t be underwriters.” Remembering her dad’s credo, she quit that sorry place and went on to a more progressive company where she quickly became the first female national accounts underwriter there. 

Her uncle suggested she keep a special coffee can on her desk to collect fines from men who made sexist insults. Ironically, they loved it and turned it into a competition to see who could incur the most fines. This took the sting out of their game. By the end of the first week, she had accumulated $30, so she went out and bought them all Dunkin’ Donuts. That was the beginning of a career based on good humor, cooperation and camaraderie with her male colleagues. In fact, Gerri is quick to credit many men for her success. “I had so many supportive male co-workers, bosses and mentors during those times and many are my good friends, even now.” 

As part of her job as head of marketing at Guy Carpenter, a subsidiary of M&M, she had to learn to play golf so she could entertain clients on the course. (Tough, right?) She got pretty good at it and later became active with the Ladies Professional Golf Association. She is a founding sponsor of The Val Skinner Foundation which stages its annual “LPGA Pros in the Fight to Eradicate Breast Cancer.” 

Gerri first came to Fire Island when she was six months old. When she returned as an adult it was first to the Pines, then she came to her senses and rented various places in Cherry Grove for many years. Thirty years ago, she met her life partner Lynne Moyer, and after a few years they bought the house on the bay which is their paradise. “Back then, I swore I was going to live there.” And she does.

Her history in the Grove is long and deep. She’s been on the Community Association Board, president of the Property Owners Association and is a Commissioner for the Cherry Grove Fire District. More recently, Gerri led the Grove-Brookhaven team that directed the renovation of Cherry Grove’s dock into a beautiful and welcoming entry to our town. Not bad for a determined woman who was taught to do the best job she could. 

Thanks Henry and Geraldine for giving us your self-reliant daughter. And thanks Gerri for your wonderful commitment to our wonderful town.