NICHOLS COLLEGE FIRE DEPARTMENT

Despite early attempts by the students to organize a student-run fire department, the Nichols College Fire Department began in earnest in 1959. Starting with two 1927 fire trucks purchased from the Cranston, Rhode Island, Fire Department and later a ladder truck and 500-gallon pumper, this all-volunteer, student organization was in charge of planning the evacuation of all college buildings in the event of an emergency and with the scheduling and supervision of fire drills, which were required to be held by all dormitories at least once each quarter. Their service came in handy on several occasions, including on February 18, 1969, when strong winds fanned a blaze that destroyed Olsen Hall. More than 75 fire fighters from the college and neighboring towns fought the blaze for more than two hours. A day after the fire, a local newspaper article on the event noted that the 25-member college fire department was credited with a big assist by the fire fighters from Dudley, Webster, and Quinebaug (CT). One from Dudley was reported as having said, “These kids know what they are doing.”

Bob McIlvain ’70

I first found out about the NCFD during freshman indoctrination. I had never heard of a college fire department, but it seemed to fit Nichols. We seemed somewhat out in the boonies then and the dorms were mostly 2 by 4 military surplus; some would see these as very flammable. I joined as soon as I could and remained a member for all four years. We had three battalions, and each member was assigned to one. Monday through Friday two of the battalions were considered on duty and therefore couldn’t leave the Hill or consume alcohol. On the weekends, only one battalion was on duty. Each battalion had a drill every week. We started by learning how to hook up the hose to the hydrant and putting on the nozzle. It sounds simple when put like that, but there were a lot of different circumstances requiring different techniques. Some of the ones I remember: Straight lay, full reverse, straight lay broken down to inch and a half, full reverse broken down to inch and a half, partial reverse, and partial reverse broken down to inch and a half. We also had ladder drills. These I didn’t like so much as I was then, and still am, scared of heights. Nonetheless, I managed to make it up to the flat roof of Academy Hall at least once a year. My freshman year we had a 40-hour advanced course for firefighting. We were taught by a fire chief from Worcester, Chief James Nally. We received certificates for the course and mine just happened to turn up during a recent move. We were called in to help Dudley Fire Department a couple of times, but we had a regular mutual aid response with Quinebaug Fire Department, just down the hill. I remember numerous brush fires in the spring. Of particular interest to me were the trucks themselves. They were old but still very useful. We had three: a 1940’s International Pumper Engine fire truck (the pump was broken but it still carried hose and some brushfire equipment), a 1941 Mack 500-gallon pumper, and my favorite (to drive), a 1927 Maxim ladder truck. None of them had synchromesh transmissions, so we had to double clutch going up and down

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Nichols Fire Department – continued the gears. We started driving them toward the end of our freshman year. As I said, by far my favorite truck to drive was the 35-foot-long ladder truck. It had a four-speed stick, no power steering, and lots of power and noise. It was just plain fun! A couple of trips around the campus on a Friday afternoon would help clear the head of cobwebs. On a couple of homecoming football games, cheerleaders hung on from the firehouse to the football field. Sadly, the last I saw it was sometime in the mid-70s when I was in the Navy in Brunswick, Maine and breezed by the campus. It was abandoned behind the maintenance building — a sad end to a long career. It would have been a great vehicle for any fire parade today.

Choo was from Korea and didn’t speak English. She had two small children with her. Billy said it took a minute to get Mrs. Choo to understand the dorm was on fire. They were able to get all of them out. Billy and the other student got their pictures in the local paper for their quick thinking.

The Nichols Fire Department was made up of volunteers; most were forestry majors and fully committed. As they rode around in the fire trucks, particularly the old hook and ladder truck whose engine made quite a racket. The NCFD sprang into action stretching their hoses and running into the flames. The local department finally showed up, but the pumps in their trucks were frozen and they could not use their hoses. It was up to the Nichols crew to put out the fire, which they did. Students flung their belongings out of windows before the flames got out of control. Professor Charles Grant, who oversaw the fire department, was in full gear and was told Professor Choo’s doctoral dissertation was still in the apartment. Without hesitation, he ran into the burning dorm and got the papers out.

We usually got about three calls a year for fires on campus. The Olsen fire was by far the biggest as we lost the total dorm. It was caused by an electrical overload but fortunately it was during the day, and everyone got out safely, though some lost their possessions. If I remember correctly, Alan Walsh ’70 had worn only a light coat to class (it was a somewhat warm February day) and lost everything in the fire. I remember seeing him as he hopped in his car with the coat and two books and headed home. No story about the fire department would be complete without a word about our commissioner, Professor “Charlie” Grant. Unknown to most, he was on the New York Fire Department during WWII.

He knew more about firefighting than any of us but did not flaunt his knowledge. He was always there when we needed him, though in a quiet but productive way. He went into Olsen at the height of the fire to retrieve Dr. Choo’s thesis. He was so unpretentious about this that I didn’t even know he had done it until Jack Hills ’69, the mayor of the Hill, gave him an award on parents day. There is also an alumnus that is well worth mentioning: Don Witcher ’70. “D.W.” as we called him, was on the fire department while at Nichols and worked at American Optical afterward. He was constantly helping us, both physically and financially. He paid for the siren that was mounted on the old gym. He joined the Southbridge Fire Department and oversaw the juniors. Unfortunately, he was killed in the mid-70s when he stopped to help what he thought was an accident but turned out to be what today would be called a carjacking. Rest in peace D.W. I hate to use the phrase, but it’s true: the fire department was a tight-knit group of guys. I’d like to say that I kept in touch, but I am a poor networker and haven’t. However, I still have strong memories of four years of teamwork and friendship.

Rick Sweet ’70

The day was in the winter of my junior year in 1968. Billy Gruber ’69 and I roomed in Olsen #306 on the top floor, the best room on campus. Olsen was across the driveway from Budleigh Hall and next to the auditorium. Two days before the start of my junior year I was hit by a car while on my motorcycle. I spent most of the year in a leg cast and on crutches.

It was the Monday after Winter Weekend. I was in my Business Statistics class, not one of my best, when the public address system announced that all Nichols firemen were excused from class, and they were to report to duty to fight the blaze at Olsen dorm. What?! I had parked my car, a 1959 4-door silver Chevrolet Biscayne, affectionately known, rust and all, as the “Silver Streak” in the back side of the dorm so I could unload it later from all the weekend’s events. It had a lot of my stuff in it including clothes and my manual typewriter I used to make money typing law briefs and term papers for students. This could be a disaster of enormous proportions.

I stood up, grabbed my crutches, and stuffed my book in my beltline to leave. The professor asked me where I was going. I informed him I was going to fight the Olsen fire and crutched my way out of the classroom. I guess it made sense because he didn’t stop me. My classmates snickered. I made it to Olsen. It was engulfed in flames due to an electrical fire, we later learned. I was able to move my car out of harm’s way. Gruber and another student had the foresight to knock on Professor Choo’s 3rd-floor apartment. Professor Choo was our dorm director. Mrs. 2

Later we were dispersed to empty rooms throughout campus. The new dorm, later called Olsen Dorm, was not yet completed. Gruber and I ended up in a room located in the basement of Goodell Hall. We had to send away a freshman squatter who wanted to room with us. Months later, we moved into the new Olsen; it was very nice. The Nichols College Fire Department was outstanding and performed as professionals. It all could have been much worse without them. When they passed a boot to collect funds to replace the equipment lost while fighting the fire, we gratefully gave.

The men of the Nichols College Fire Department were our heroes. Thank you all for your service then and now.

Fran Keefe ’73

My Uncle Joe Keefe from Newton, Massachusetts, was the head mechanic of the Newton Fire Department. He had quite a reputation as a fire equipment “whisperer.” He came up to Nichols during the 1960s to offer advice and worked on the antiquated equipment. He was a valuable resource for years.

Tom Bassett ’75

I was a member of the NCFD from 1971 through 1975. I was the Deputy Chief and wrote a column for the issues of The Bison called Bells and Blazes. I recall a house fire on the Dudley/Quinebaug town line, the Treasure Island fire in Webster, a student grazed by a bullet in Budleigh Hall, a fire bug on campus (found him) and a larger brush/ forest fire in Dudley out toward Oxford.

Engine 1 was driven by Jim Krieger ’77 who went on for a career in the New York City Fire Department, retiring as a Captain a few years after the September 11 attacks. Several other members from my time also went on to careers in the fire service. My roommate and chief at the time, Glenn Coffin ’76 went on to be a chief on a department on Cape Cod. Many of us at that time came to Nichols with experience from our hometown departments.

My active firefighting post-Nichols was with the Village of Briarcliff Manor Fire Department’s Scarborough Engine Company in New York where I served for 37 years. I remain a life member and most senior member of the company. (Senior member because I have outlived everyone else.) I continued as a volunteer in my hometown near Savannah, Georgia. My brother Michael ’78 lives in Ossing, New York, as a captain and later his son a captain as well. My brother Bill ‘73 did not serve with the NCFD but joined his brothers at home to be the company’s chief driver and his son also served as a captain. Michael continues to be the chief driver instructing driving and pump operations to new members. His son, Bill III was also a captain of the fire department and is currently a sergeant with the Village of Briarcliff Manor Police Department. Firefighting is very much a family business which started with our father, grandfathers and great uncles serving Tarrytown and North Tarrytown (now Sleepy Hallow) fire departments.

Mike Bassett ’78

I was a member of the department from the fall of 1974 until May of 1977. It was a great group of guys and many of the friendships continue to this day. The biggest event during my tenure was the New Dorm fire in the spring of 1976.

My room was located on the third floor of New Dorm where we housed all the fire and security phones and radios for the department. Bob Cohen ’77, the chief of the department, came home about 2am and we talked in my room for a few minutes. He went to use the bathroom and came back and said there was smoke coming up through the floor. When the guy across the hall opened his door, we could see smoke coming through the electrical outlets and smoke out the back window from the second-floor landing. Chief Cohen pulled the fire alarm and began to evacuate the residents of the third floor, and I made the calls to the Dudley Fire Department and to the security detail on campus and sounded the campus fire whistle. By this time, the stairwells were filling with smoke, so myself and most of the other third-floor residents used bedsheets tied to the radiator and climbed out the third-floor window and then had to jump a few feet onto the roof over the first floor landing where other students were standing to support us. A couple of the students received minor injuries in exiting.

Most of us who were on the department got our fire gear and assisted the other members of the department who had responded with Engine 16 and the Dudley Fire Department. The fire was extinguished quickly, but there was severe heat and smoke damage on the second floor of the dorm. The fire alarm melted off the wall; records in another room began to melt.

There was some concern as to the cause of fire and the college asked the State Police to investigate, so that there was no long-term safety issue for the residents. The State Police came and did their investigation and determined that the cause of the fire was from the use of fireworks and a bottle rocket going off into the room of origin. The college to their credit was not looking to punish the persons involved, but to make sure there was not any kind of danger from something else.

One of the drawbacks of the fire, was that we either had to throw all are belongings out or have them cleaned. Couches and stuff alike filled the dumpsters. The company that came to repair the damage developed a friendship with the guys in our dorm and we ended up having all playing a softball game together.

My time with the Nichols College Fire Department allowed me to find what I wanted to do in life and after leaving Nichols, I went on to have a 34-year career as a police officer. I am currently in my 50th year as an active firefighter in my hometown. Probably the most memorable person at the college was Herb Durfee who was the head of security at the time. He was a real character who loved to stir the soup and at the same time when it was time to buckle down, he was able to take the appropriate action.

Rob McDiarmid ’98

When my roommate moved out after only 3 days my freshman year, I wasn’t sure what to do. I figured he’d be my first friend and would make more from there. I went looking around for kids in a similar situation to bond with as I began living away from home for the first time. The group I ended up finding was one of the friendliest, most fun, welcoming crew I have ever met, before, during, or after Nichols. The members of the Nichols College Fire Department greeted me with open arms from day one. They gave me a nickname, showed me around campus and the fire station behind the auditorium, and got me set up with gear and instruction. We trained each week, hung out every weekend, rolled deep into the cafeteria for meals, and gathered every Thursday for “must-see-TV,” back when that was a thing.

It was a dedicated crew, not only responding to calls on campus for alarms and medical issues, but also many volunteering in the town of Dudley for overnight ambulance shifts and emergency calls. On top of schoolwork, college life, and extracurriculars, the members managed to staff the department 24 hours a day for emergencies. Countless trips made to Hubbard and Harrington hospitals for students in need, responding to dorm-room-lockouts with ladders, fires, or emergencies small and large on campus, and coordinating with the Dudley Fire Department.

I learned to get over my fear of heights while climbing ladders in drills and how to drive a 25,000-pound truck with a manual transmission and back it uphill into the station where the doors had about 2 inches of clearance on each side. We made training drills fun. We played 3-on3 basketball in full gear and air pack to practice how to control our breathing. The brush clearing and burning on the campus golf course was run by NCFD, as was the maintenance and testing of all the fire alarms on campus.

Some members continued in the field after graduation, whether as volunteers or as a professional career. Many of us went to train at the Massachusetts Fire Academy in Stow, which was an incredible experience, if slightly intimidating. We spent days running into burning concrete training buildings, extinguishing exploding propane tanks, and practicing extricating people out of cars with the jaws of life. I recall one of our biggest burn building day of drills before graduation for structural firefighting, which ended with a cellar fire drill final exam. Each person was outfitted with a hose and had to slide on their belly through bulkhead doors and down stairs into a pitch black, fully engulfed basement to put out a fire of pallets and hay. I still get chills – one of the coolest things I’ve ever done. It made a Nichols final exam seem chill in comparison.

The Nichols College Fire Department was certainly one of the most influential experiences I had while on campus. I cherish the camaraderie, sense of teamwork, skills learned, and both the thrill and responsibility for others in equal parts. It’s one of my favorite college memories and I have enjoyed connecting with former NCFD folks at Homecoming. I am thankful for the great group of men and women that welcomed me in that first year and proud of the work of the NCFD over the years of its existence.

The Nichols College Fire Department was dissolved in 1999. The equipment was sold or donated to local fire department training programs. Many in the Nichols College community relied on this group for years and are forever grateful for their commitment and service.