Mayor Ray Flynn first displays his “hands-on” approach to the office.

During the year’s first winter storm, the new mayor rides along with Public Works Department snowplow drivers throughout the night. He subsequently talks a would-be suicide down from a bridge in East Boston on July 5, 1984, leads people to safety from a 14th floor fire at the Prudential Center on January 2, 1986, helps police end a siege by a gun-wielding man in Roxbury on July 14, 1987, takes part in various charity baseball and basketball games, and runs annually in the Boston Marathon.