Paul A. Curry, 93; opened Quincy hardware store

Paul Andrew Curry was a former shipyard worker who lived a blue-collar worker's dream: He became his own boss when he opened Curry Hardware in Quincy in 1945.

"He had very little formal education, so he knew what he had to do. He had to do it on his own and go into business for himself," Robert Curry of Quincy said of his father, 93, who died Monday in John Adams Continuing Care Center in Quincy.

The son of a stonecutter at a Quincy quarry, Mr. Curry left school in the eighth grade to help support his family.

"He was a scrapper as a kid. He wasn't afraid of anything or anybody," another son, Paul of Gloucester, said yesterday.

Mr. Curry dug foundation holes for new three-decker homes in Adams Village in Dorchester and did auto salvage work at a junkyard before becoming a crane operator at the Fore River Shipyard in Quincy.

"If it wasn't for the shipyard and 25 hours or so of overtime each week during World War II, he never would have made it," said Robert, who took over the hardware store about 30 years ago when his father retired.

Curry Ace Hardware now has stores at two locations: Copeland Street in Quincy and Quincy Avenue in Braintree.

"He started the business with five or six thousand dollars, a couple of screwdrivers, and a handful of hammers. He never would have made it today," Robert Curry said.

Mr. Curry, his son said, probably did not know about home improvement and repair projects when he opened the store, but he soon learned about plumbing and electrical repairs.

"If he couldn't do it, he knew how to tell you how to do it," he said.

Mr. Curry had nine children and put them all to work in the Quincy store.

"I don't think he ever hired outside help," Robert Curry said. "I remember stopping by before school to bring out wheelbarrows and shovels to display in front of the store."

Mr. Curry loved to sing, and he could often be heard whistling as he patrolled the aisles of his store.

"He loved the interchange with his customers," Robert Curry said. "He wasn't really a businessman. He just loved people and being around them."

Mr. Curry worked six days a week at the hardware store. Every Sunday he did the bookkeeping on the dinner table at home.

"He only had an eighth-grade education, but he could add up a footlong list of figures faster than I could do it on a calculator," his son said.

He could be strict at times. "He was a Depression-era kind of dad," Robert Curry said. "He was the disciplinarian in the family."

Every night, Mr. Curry sat down to dinner with his family. "There would be 11 people at the dinner table, and afterward he'd wash every dish," Paul Curry said. "And he did it every single night."

Mr. Curry would then take a catnap before doing work around the house. He spent a few years cracking and removing several boulders the size of automobiles from the backyard of his home in West Quincy.

"He was a high-energy guy," Paul Curry said.

In addition to his sons Robert and Paul, he leaves four other sons, James of Rockville, Md., Daniel of Bridgewater, Gerald of Union, Maine, and Joseph of Wrentham; three daughters, Margaret Murphy of Plymouth, Kathleen Hunt of Nevada City, Calif., and Nancy Greenblatt of Canton; three sisters, Dorothy Donovan of Lewiston, Maine, Clara King of Quincy, and Marjorie Mara of Falmouth; 24 grandchildren; and 35 great-grandchildren.

A funeral Mass will be said at 10 a.m. tomorrow in St. Mary's Church in Quincy. Burial will be in St. Mary's Cemetery in Quincy.