Mason Kraese, volunteer Huntington Manor firefighter and Walt Whitman High grad, dies at 27

Mason Kraese, a Huntington Manor firefighter, professional steamfitter, amateur mechanic and former teen actor, died Saturday after an all-terrain vehicle crash in upstate Summit. He was 27.

His death, which Newsday reported earlier this week, was confirmed by the Schoharie County Sheriff’s Office and by his family.

Kraese, of Huntington Station, joined Steamfitters Local 638 after graduation from Walt Whitman High School in 2016. The profession took him from Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory to the Long Island City office of Trane Technologies, an HVAC company, where he worked at the time of his death.

He followed his maternal grandfather and parents into the Huntington Manor Fire Department, serving as a junior member and, since 2019, as a full-fledged volunteer, according to a photograph of his induction he posted on social media that year.

It was rare for Kraese to post a photograph of himself, he wrote in a caption accompanying that photograph.

His accounts were dedicated almost entirely to the loving documentation of a Jeep Liberty modified with a snorkel-like exhaust and a massive GMC Denali pickup he drove to Long Island’s beaches and truck pulls at a spot on Sound Avenue in Riverhead.

Kraese posted hundreds of images of the vehicles, both mud-spattered and gleaming: TikTok for the truck and Instagram for the Jeep.

"The way his truck ran — it was flawless in how it ran, and you could tell by the sound and the way it ran, he knew his truck had power," said Ed Yeager, president of the Long Island Antique Power Association, which organizes the meets. "When he got up and grabbed the hook and tightened the chain, the green flag dropped, he took off. Some of these guys are a little on the slow side, they take their time. No, he let you know."

Loved 'working on his truck'

In competitive pulling, drivers drag a weighted sled across a course. Kraese pulled a personal best of 12,000 pounds this summer, his parents said.

"He’s very tactile," Kraese’s father, Philip, also a steamfitter, said of his son. "He loves working on his truck, his quad, carpentry, the work of building something."

Kraese bought his Jeep with money he earned as a background actor. After he met New Hyde Park filmmaker Candice T. Cain, the jobs multiplied, they said: football player, wrestler and courtroom spectator on shows in the "Law and Order" universe, uncredited lacrosse player in the 2015 movie "Fan Girl," with Meg Ryan. After graduation from high school, he acted less and worked more, said his mother, Mary Beth, membership concierge at the Garden City health club Life Time.

Kraese’s parents said he had hoped to farm. They denied his petition to keep a goat at the family home because, they said, it was not permitted by town regulations, but encouraged his gardening. "I told him he had full range to do whatever he wanted," Mary Beth said. He grew wildflowers, potatoes, peppers, tomatoes and corn. His parents said the tomatoes did not thrive this summer but the corn was delicious.

In addition to his parents, Kraese is survived by younger brothers Gunnar and Colton. He also is survived by grandparents Richard and Barbara Kraese and grandfather Frederick Steenson. He was predeceased by his grandmother Elizabeth Steenson. The family all live in Huntington Station.

Visitation will be at the Huntington Manor Fire Department, 1650 New York Ave., in Huntington Station on Saturday from 1-5 p.m. and 7-9 p.m. and Sunday from 1-4 p.m. and   6-9 p.m.  Firematic services will be 7 p.m. Sunday. Burial will be Monday at Melville Cemetery.

The family has set up a GoFundMe to cover burial expenses; the Antique Power Association will accept donations at an upcoming pull that will be dedicated to his memory.

By Nicholas Spangler

nicholas.spangler@newsday.comspanglernewsday

Nicholas Spangler is a general assignment reporter and has worked at Newsday since 2010.