Northbrook native who was among 34 killed in California boat fire left job in Hollywood to live dream, work on ocean.

Allie Kurtz | Provided photo

As an awestruck kid aboard a tall ship at Navy Pier, Allie Kurtz looked up at her grandmother, Doris Lapporte, and told her that one day she’d be a pirate.

The declaration came after hours of following around members of the boat’s crew, who were dressed as pirates, and asking them how she, too, could become one.

Last week, nearly two decades later, Lapporte received a text that made her smile.

“I’ve achieved my dream of being a pirate,” it read.

”That was her very, very last message to me,” Lapporte said Friday.

Kurtz, 26, who grew up in Northbrook, had recently been promoted from working in the galley as a cook aboard a boat that took groups on multi-day scuba diving trips off the coast of Southern California, to the position of deckhand on another dive boat — the Conception.

During the predawn hours Monday, the Conception caught fire and Kurtz was among the 34 people on board who were killed. Her remains were identified through DNA testing Thursday.

Her family had hoped she was the five crew members who were above deck and able to escape as the boat became engulfed in flames.

“But she was the one crew member who was assigned to be below with the passengers to attend to any of their needs,” Lapporte said.

Allie Kurtz

“Allie was just thrilled when she was promoted,” Lapporte said, adding her granddaughter had been building up her experience as a diver but had not yet reached the point where she was part of the dive crew.

She had the heart of an adventurer and “died doing what she loved,” Lapporte said through tears from her Skokie home as she sorted through photos and poems her granddaughter had written about the ocean.

After high school, Kurtz embarked on a solo backpacking trip across Europe that made her family nervous for her safety.

“The only reason she never ran with the bulls in Pamplona, Spain, is because she lost her passport,” Lapporte said, admitting she was thankful the document went missing at the time.

Life soon landed Kurtz in London, where she studied theater before leaving school to work with a company that produced reality television shows.

She returned to the United States and took a job working on movie trailers for Paramount Pictures, Lapporte said.

Kurtz left that job to work at the dive tour company, Truth Aquatics, a few months ago, Lapporte said.

The ocean had been the source of a lifelong fascination for Kurtz, who’d also been taking environmental classes at UCLA with the goal of studying marine biology.

Allie Kurtz

She also volunteered to care for wounded sea lions, Lapporte said.

Kurtz had recently received a work visa to pursue a job in Australia. She planned to leave in a few months, when the high season for tour diving concluded, Lapporte said.

“At 26, it’s just the beginning ... and she had a zest for life like you just couldn’t imagine,” she said.

Kurtz is a graduate of Glenbrook North High School. Her father, Robert Kurtz, was in California on Friday with others who were close to his daughter, Lapporte said. Allie Kurtz has a brother, Zac, 23, and a sister, Olivia, 20.

Allie Kurtz with her grandfather, Allen Lapporte

“We’ve been getting messages from people all over the world, some who just knew her just a couple days on a boat. Her love of life was just contagious. She touched so many people,” Lapporte said.

Family members plan to scatter her ashes at sea.