Volunteer Fire Departments

As I was writing about our local property owners' association meeting, I thought about the Volunteer Fire Fighting Force that we are fortunate enough to have in our area.  I did a quick google search on the Hondo Volunteer Fire Dept. and found an article on the Santa Fe County website that gives a brief history on the Dept.  This fire department started in 1974 out of necessity.  The residents were scattered around the foothills and were too far away for the City of Santa Fe to provide service, so a bunch of people from various homeowners' associations cobbled together some old fire fighting equipment that would be on demand for locals needing help.  

I remember the early days of this fire department but not the exact beginning because I didn't come onto the scene until 1978 when I moved to Santa Fe and started the first professional chimney sweeping service in the area.  Hondo was already in existence and I didn't understand that they really were in their infancy.  Today, we are privileged to have an outstanding network of fire departments in our area with a brand new regional fire house just 2 miles from our home.  

I laughed to myself when I read this history.  Last night after the property owners' meeting at the fire house, I went to visit with a group of friends.  One of the guys there and I started talking about Novacool and how great it is to have this available to us.  This friend of mine is a collector of old cars and trucks and more things than I have time to go into.  His eyes lit up and he told me that he had a couple of 200 gallon poly tanks at his place and that by golly, he could put those on his old truck (well, at 200 gallons, he could at least put on one...!) and rig up a gasoline powered pump to pump the water out and use the NovaCool.  It would just sit there until one of the neighbors or the neighborhood needed help putting out a fire.  The funny thing is that he jumped to that conclusion before I had said anything about offering a complete line of sprayers to do just that and his reaction is the same as that that gave birth to the Hondo Fire Dept.  Concern for one's neighbors and knowing that you can be of help if needed. It's a great spirit that these volunteers bring to their community and one that I appreciate, fully.  Being equipped to protect our own property empowers me to know that if needed, I can help my neighbors in a big way by having my own mini-fire department.  And my buddy immediately grasped the idea that he could turn his water storage tanks into something really useful in his neighborhood.  

Here's to Volunteer Fire Departments across America!