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Silver City Volunteer Fire Department Silver City, Oklahoma |
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"If you page us, we will come." |
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At a public meeting held at the Silver City Free Will Baptist Church on July 9, 1996, the Silver City Volunteer Fire Department and Silver City Fire District were officially formed. With the first two of four Forestry trucks rigged and ready (and hundreds of hours of training on the part of our volunteers), Silver City VFD became operational at 12:01 AM on Tuesday, January 9, 1997, exactly six months to the day from the date it was born. At the time we became operational, we stored our first grass rig in the Fire Chief's barn. |
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We purchased 3 1/2 acres in October 1997 upon which to build a fire station, with room to spare for such things as helipads for air ambulances. A 60 X 70 barn sits on this property, which provides a convenient place to keep unsightly accumulations of VFD junk out of sight. The property was not what you would call "in good shape" when we purchased it. This is what it looked like from across the street. It had not been mowed in years, and had weeds about five feet high on most of the property. You can barely see the roof of the old barn on the right side of the picture. |
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You couldn't walk ten feet without tripping over something, like concrete blocks, rocks, buckets, pieces of lumber, sheet metal, old tires, small engines (there were several small engines scattered around, for some reason), or other assorted junk.
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The car mysteriously disappeared about two weeks after we bought the place. Nobody saw who came and got it. Saved us the trouble of hauling it off somewhere, though. We probably would have used it for a vehicle extrication class. |
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So we burned it off, so we could see well enough to pick up all the big chunks. Then we mowed it. |
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We built the first three bays of our fire station in the foreground with a $20,000 grant. You can see the old barn in this photo, and believe me, it looks nothing like that now. The barn refurbishment project is an epic tale in it's own right, but rather than bore you with ALL of the details here, just look at the "before" and "after" elsewhere on this site.
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We purchased our first pumper from Prairie DuPont Fire Department in January, 1998. |
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Silver City Fire Department T-shirt, 1997 |
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undated photo from the Jim McLaughlin Collection - used by permission |
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Photo by Bryan Beall, 1997 |
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It’s a bookshelf… get it?? |
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Photo by Bill Beall, 1997 |
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Photo by Bill Beall, 1997 |
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Photo by Bill Beall, 1997 |
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Photo by Bill Beall, 1997 |
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Photo by Bill Beall, 1997 |
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Photo by Bill Beall, 1997 |
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Photo by Bill Beall, 1997 |
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Photo by Bryan Beall, 1997 |
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Photo by Bill Beall, 1997 |
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Photo by Janet Rush, 1998 |
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We finally occupied our new 3-bay fire station (designed for expansion) in August 1998. It was Spartan (and still is), but it got the job done. |
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Photo by Todd M. Eubanks, 1999 |
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In June, 1999, we technically qualified for ISO Class 9. It became official as of January 1, 2000. This was a major event in our history, as it resulted in an approximate $90 per year savings in local fire insurance costs for the average resident within five road miles of our fire station.
We learned that within a couple of years the local Rural Water District planned to run a main right in front of our station, and otherwise generally throughout most of our fire district. Therefore, we did not attempt to gear up for water shuttle to qualify for ISO Class 8 or better, as we might very well be able to do it with HYDRANTS.
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In June, 2000, we were awarded a $25,000 grant to expand our fire station. In May 2001, we occupied the expansion. Don't ask us why it takes a year to get stuff like this done. We honestly don't know. Believe us, if it were possible, we would have done it sooner. |
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Photo by Bill Beall, January 2002 |
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Silver City Fire Department T-shirt, 2000 |
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As of January, 2002, we had acquired another 6x6 (from Forestry), another pumper (purchased cheap, old but reliable), and a Chief's vehicle (donated). We've already outgrown our station again. Good thing we have that old barn, ay? |
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Photo by Bill Beall, January 2002 |
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In August, 2002 we were notified that we had been awarded a FIRE Act Grant in the amount of $19,350 in order to purchase new turnout gear. At this stage in the game, we had acquired pretty much everything we needed. It took six years to get to this point. From here, we continued to train, and began to concentrate on improvements and upgrades rather than acquisitions. |
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On October 26, 2002, we took delivery of this little baby which we put into service in 2003 as a First Responder/Rescue unit. This truck was PACKED with equipment when we received it. More equipment than we could use. We passed the excess to several other area fire departments.
With all due respect to fire departments that run yellow trucks, around here we could easily be mistaken for plumbers if we arrived at a scene in something that looked like this. |
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Photo by Bryan Beall, October 2002 |
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(There. That's much better.) |
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Photo by Bill Beall, October 2002 |
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In order to augment the handful of First Responders and EMTs that we already had, these people completed a 54-hour EMS First Responder course on April 24, 2003. They enabled us to begin to respond to medical calls in are area in support of Mannford EMS. |
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Back Row: B. E. Beall, Ken Richards, Rob Christensen, "Moose" Fowler, Ken Christensen |
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Our Very Brief History, part I |
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January to May of 1996 was the worst fire season Oklahoma had seen in 51 years. At least, that's what they say. Since most of us weren't around then, we took the older people's word for it, along with then-Governor Keating's (who was at that time, come to think of it, an older person). Fires swept through Silver City and surrounding areas during that period (we were ALL here for that), and a public meeting was called in June to determine the level of community support and the feasibility of forming a fire department. |
