Episode 36 - From Fixing Rigs to Assistant Chief: Bill Rigg's Unforgettable Career

In this episode, retired Ventura City assistant chief Bill Rigg shares his experiences and stories from his career in the fire service. He discusses starting as a firefighter mechanic and the transition to having maintenance done by the city yard. He shares personal stories, including a funny story about a fight between two assistant chiefs. Bill also discusses call volume during his time in the fire service, expansion of fire stations, responding to the Rodney King riots, and he provides retirement advice for current firefighters.

Transcript

Peter

Welcome to the Firehouse Round Table Podcast, brought to you by the Ventura Fire Foundation. I'm one of your hosts. Peter McKenzie, retired fire captain with the city of Ventura Fire Department and my co-host Jason Kay, Active Battalion Chief with the City of Ventura. Fire department. We are going to bring awareness to real issues that face firefighters and their families. We want you to feel like you have a seat at the kitchen table, which every firefighter knows is the heart of the Firehouse. Let's get right into the episode. All right, welcome to another episode of the Firehouse Roundtable. Today we have, along with Jason Path of retired Assistant Chief Bill Riggs, so chief rig. Welcome to the show. We're excited to have you.

Bill

Well, thank you. I'm happy to be here and just call me Bill.

Peter

OK, you got it. We will call you, Bill, but why don't you start by introducing yourselves to some of the new guys or some people who might not know who you are. Just give us a quick little bio.

Bill

Sure.

Peter

One yeah.

Bill

Sure. My name is Bill Rigg. I was hired in January of 1973. At the time, I had just returned from Vietnam, about 18 months before. And I've been taking fire science classes and I got on the fire department. I was a single hire as a firefighter slash mechanic. And at that time, the department did all its own maintenance on all the equipment, all the apparatus and everything up up to engine overhauls. And it was at the old Fire Station 1, which is now the clock tower in on Santa Clara St. just below the. Mission.

Peter

Was that was firefighter mechanic an actual like rank or was that?

Bill

No, I. It just. I was a master mechanic to begin with and during my oral testing with three chief officers, they were looking for a mechanic because they had a captain. That was a mechanic and a firefighter.

Peter

No.

Speaker

Hmm.

Bill

And then that Captain went off on the injury. And so they needed someone else.

Peter

How would that work? So let's say there was a repair that happened. And would you do it while you were? On duty? Or would you come in off duty or?

Bill

I would be on duty doing it. It was all on duty and I was on the job trainee because there was they had a fire Academy for our new hires for six of us. A year later.

Speaker

Hmm.

Bill

But there were two fire 2 firefighters hired in front of me and then I was hired and then three more were hired together after me.

Peter

Do you know their? Do you remember their names? Can. We throw out their names.

Bill

Hired before me was uh, Steve Sir was right before me. And and then the one before that. I'm. I'm not sure of his name. And then afterwards it it was Brian Gordon. And I'm not sure who else now.

Peter

OK, OK. Gotcha. Gotcha. I recognize Brian Gordon's name. No, I don't recognize Sir Steve, Sir. But how many years did you? How many years did you do before you retired?

Bill

Yes. I retired just a a month and a half short of 30 years.

Peter

Ohh, nice so a nice long career.

Bill

And I didn't have a choice, really. When I retired, because I I had gotten injured. I I actually worked with a broken back for 21 years.

Peter

Oh wow.

Bill

And then they found it finally, and I had some fights with workers comp over at similar to what miles is going through. And then I ended up in court and then I was not allowed to come back to work after the surgery.

Peter

Was that tough? I'm assuming that's not the way you wanted. To go out.

Bill

The timing of it it it was tough because. The city had made a mistake on my time and actually let me go a few weeks earlier than I thought was going to happen and. And when I went off and got injured when I was injured and went off on workers comp, they cut my pay. And that wasn't legal in the state of California, but. They tried it anyway.

Jason

You guys had a lot of battles that you kind of forged away for some of our guys and we still fight some of the battles. Like you're talking about Miles is dealing with right now, but I can't imagine just stopping your pay as a. Firefighter, when you get injured, well they they.

Bill

They just cut it. They cut it about $850 a month. Wow. And then and then I was off and just getting temporary disability.

Speaker

M.

Bill

And then they were fine. My daughter, I went to my own doctor, a orthopedic surgeon, and he found it right away. But they fought that for a few months.

Peter

Wow, I just.

Bill

Friend.

Jason

Got off duty this morning and Tony Hill was my relief and he said to say hi and it's for him. Yeah. Just for some history. I got hired, I think right as you were dealing with your back injury and going off duty. Right. So you were, you were still the assistant chief. One of the assistant chief. When I got hired.

Bill

Yeah, Tommy. Right.

Jason

Did you hold every red?

Bill

Correct, I remember.

Jason

You do firefighter.

Bill

I remember that.

Jason

And then engineer and then and then chief design chief and then assistant.

Bill

Yes. That's what I did and. I I was a firefighter probably five years at at the time when I was hired, the chief officers met and talked about how promotable you were. And you, you if you scored 100% on it the test. 5% was immediately taken away. Be if you weren't. Hadn't been there five years cause that was seniority points. And then the chief officers opinion of you was another 5%. So if you were in ill favor but in less than five years, you the highest you could get was 90%.

Speaker

Hmm.

Jason

Well, so how how many? How many years did you do each of those ranks?

Bill

I I was a firefighter. I think about five years and the first three or four years of that I was firefighters last doing mechanical work. And then I was the engineer about eight or nine years. Because the list would be good, uh, a year or two years and then they would retest again and I would be on the cusp, but I would be next to be hired and then the list would be thrown out and they'd start over again or something like that. And. Then I was moved up to acting captain from engineer because I was high on the list when Cecil Newton, he was the captain and he was on a fire over in Santa Paula. And at a packing house. And he was moving A5 inch hose broke. And swung around and hit him and knocked him down. And so he was off a month and 1/2 or so. So I just moved up to act in his place.

Peter

How did? How did it come about? Where you stopped, where we stopped working on the apparatus ourselves in the state.

Bill

Well, the city Arts started doing it. They decided it was better to have the city yard because we were at station one and the manpower when I was hired we we had 18 people on duty a day. And we had four stations. And the we had aerial ladder truck out at Station 3 and that was a. I think it was the sea grace. It was 75 foot aerial ladder and it was like a 1948 ladder truck, but it had been rebooted with a diesel engine and. So they had five people at that station, and if it was a truck call, 2 would go on the truck and it was the engine call 4 would go on the engine if the truck wasn't going.

Peter

Interesting. So I just want to add a little context for what we're what we're hoping to do with this podcast is we have a couple different like. Series of of shows that we do and this one is 100% all about documenting our history and and you know, getting some of those stories that are slowly fading away, you know on on, on camera or audio or whatever.

Bill

OK. Right.

Peter

I want to call it. We I I was at a retirement party recently. I think it was. I wonder if you ever well, you know, Tom, I know for sure. Right, Tom winell around. So yeah, it was Tom Wynell, Tom Hoffman and Kramer. Right, Jason?

Bill

Ohh yeah yeah, I worked with him for. Years. Great.

Speaker

MM.

Peter

Was that the retirement party? Yeah. Yeah. So we were there and I ran into Chief McPherson. Don McPherson, you know, and I I, I we were having a conversation because he's kind of like I would say, like a little bit of a historian of the department, which is awesome. So I'm picking his brain and say, hey, who do we need to get on the podcast?

Bill

Uh-huh. Ohh yeah yeah.

Peter

Who do we? You know, who would who would really do a good job talking about? Some of these historical things and the stories and whatnot and you were bar bar none. His number one choice so. That's why you're here. So we want to get into the stuff that you know, people are forgetting, like some of those names you you brought up Cecil Newton that I've heard his name going around quite a bit. I I think what's interesting to me personally is that guys, when you when you got hired on the guys that were leaving, the guys that were retiring.

Bill

Right.

Peter

Is that generation? I feel like it's almost anonymous to me and Jason, unless there's like a few names that come up.

Bill

Uh-huh.

Peter

But you you probably have some stories of of things that happened back then or just what, what stage in life was like or what, what the fire department was back then versus how it was when you left. So that's not really a specific question, but that's kind of the angle I'm coming from and and what I'm trying to hope to get out of this. So yeah, you want to take it from there.

Bill

Right. Right. Sure. Sure. I I can just start kind of by at the beginning, if you want, in a way the the hiring process was a a written exam. Ma'am. And then you had an oral with and the oral was with three chief officers. And then the physical part of the exam, you had a physical from a doctor, which you went to a doctor at. He had an office near Community Hospital and he put you in a closet and talked to you and tested your hearing. And look to see if you had teeth and two eyes and two ears and 10 fingers. And that was it. And then the physical agility part of the test was you had to do 6 burpees, 4 pull-ups and lay a line. A certain distance come off the back of the engine, pull a three inch line out and wrap it around the hydrant within 60 seconds behind the old station one, and that was the extent of it. And then. My oral exam with the chief officers was very. Humorous and interesting because one chief officer, the only thing he ever asked me was mechanical questions. It would come to his turn and he would say, can you overhaul a carburetor? Or he would say, have you worked on a transmission before and and questions like?

Peter

Do you know? Do you know what? A wheel is.

Bill

And and then Chief Sharp, one of the other chiefs there was was that would ask how well you get along with people. And he had asked about specific occasions and he wanted to know. Have you? Are you OK sleeping with men? That was one of the questions. And I said in the same bed and and the other two chiefs just cracked up. And so it it was kind of funny.

Peter

I don't think you can ask that. Yeah, I don't think you could ask that question today. It's not get in trouble for.

Bill

Because at the time.

Jason

Yeah.

Peter

No.

Bill

Yeah, and and at the time, it was all open dorms. So the captain had slept in the door at station one. The captain and the duty chief slept in the same dorm, and then in the other stations, the captain had his a dorm by himself and everybody else was together.

Peter

So you got hired in 1973? I'm. Trying. I'm just. Trying to do the math, the people, the, the, the guys that were retiring when you got hired 30 years before then would have put them in like the late. 40s like what was that?

Bill

Right.

Peter

Which it would, they wouldn't have. Been World War 2. Well, they could have been potentially. Yeah, yeah.

Bill

They could have been a Korean.

Peter

What was that? What was that generation like like?

Bill

It it was very interesting because I was a new hire, I was a newbie. I I had been there. I think maybe 10 days and I was invited to go to a retirement party and when I went to the party the I don't remember the. The gentleman's name that was retiring, but I was the one hired to take his place and I'd never met him before. And he came up to me and he shook my hand and said, you're the guy that stole my job.

Speaker

Hmm.

Bill

And I'm like what?

Peter

So there's always, there's always this thing. I don't think it's just in the fire service. I think it's in general like, you know, oh, this generation of of firemen are the way they used to be when I got hired or when we were here. You arguably so you it sounds like you did some time in Vietnam. You came back late 60s, early 70s, got hired. How did that generate that World War 2 Korean War generation? Look at your generation. What what? What was was there some differences there? I'm assuming there was, but what was the the general feeling?

Bill

There, there were some differences and I had a little trouble with a little of it. A couple of guys. Ray Martin was kind of a testy guy. I got to know him real well and became very good friends with him. But in the beginning he was kind of a testy guy and and he got in the habit of calling me boy. And I did not like that and and then one time I was out in the. Garage area where the pit is. And I was there with Joe Yant, another firefighter who who was became very good friends with me and and he called me Boy, and I lost my temper. And I turned around and I picked him up by the throat and had him on the front of the hood of a.

Speaker

Oh.

Bill

A A4 wheel drive brush, little pickup we had. And and it was kind of choking him and saying don't call me boy.

Jason

When you say the the pit is that where you where you worked as a mechanic at Station 1?

Bill

Yeah, they have a where the museum was on the side of the Clock Tower Inn was actually a a pit in under under the engine so you could drive over it and then get down in the pit to work underneath it.

Speaker

M.

Jason

When you started, how many fire fire stations were there?

Speaker

And that's.

Bill

When I started, there were four. There were three people on duty at station 4-5 people on duty at Station 3. Four people at Station 2 and when I came on, there were seven people at station one because the each of the three shifts had a inspector, fire inspector and we dispatched our cells also at that time. When I came on so as a junior firefighter, you learned how to dispatch and you dispatched all the other stations. The calls came into a keyboard. From outside calls and then we had a fire phone on the end of the pier, which was a real pain and people would be out there on the pier drunk and take the phone off the hook. And then I fired the junior firefighter had to get up and go drive out there and go. Go out the pier and hanging the phone up.

Peter

I got I got. I want to go. I want to go back to the the story where you picked up. Was it Ray Martin who you picked up by the neck?

Bill

No, it's Joe young.

Peter

Yeah, Joe. Yeah. So after that, what happened? It did it end there or like I, I imagine the HR rules and all that was a whole different game back then. But what? What did that look like? After that.

Bill

Ohh I apologize because I had lost my temper and he was kind of rubbing his neck and he's saying, Gee, I want I I'll never call you that again. And then it it kind of slid by. I don't think, I don't know if he told anybody else.

Speaker

Yeah.

Peter

I find that when you're when you're in the fire service and you're surrounded by a bunch of like type A alpha, people like it and somebody's like not. Being treated how they think they need to be treated like it usually only takes one or two of those types of. If sentences where people are like, OK, yeah, we're not going to mess with Bill because I don't want to. I don't want to be choked out on the top of a of an apparatus, but.

Bill

Yeah, yeah, I I don't know. I'm sure his brother found out about it, but. Cause his his brother was the captain on B shift and I was on C Shift and Joe was on C shift.

Speaker 4

Ah.

Speaker

Yeah.

Bill

And then the the way it worked is if the engine left on a call and during the day that somebody, one of the firefighters had to run the radio and do the dispatching during the daylight hours and if there was a call at station one that was taking the snorkel. We had 85 foot crown snorkel. And a 64 crown. Coach and if if it was a call where all six people were needed, the Chief Secretary would go up and run the radio and do dispatch. Until uh, we came back and and so we did our own dispatching and our own maintenance in the beginning. And the police did too.

Peter

Yeah, yeah. Who were some of The Who were. You know, how you go through your career in the fire service and you have, like, a core group of. People. That you stay in touch with, have you know, really good relationships with who are those people for you?

Bill

Right, right. For me, it was Brian Gordon and Bob Reedy. Uh, there's a group of us that like to water ski and snow ski. And so we would go snow skiing. That Don McPherson got into that. Chuck Young was part of it and we would go up to mammoth and rent a rent, a condo. And usually my wife and I would go up a day or two early and and. Pay for the whole condo ourselves for those days, and then we split it. And there was usually three or four groups or families that would go up there and bring their kid.

Speaker 4

It's.

Bill

And and go up to mammoth and ski in the area. And one one year we rented a cabin together instead and then, uh, we would also we had boats, so we'd go water skiing up in Monterey County at Lake San Antonio.

Jason

Some of the things that you've said today already are ringing bells in my head. So when you talked about common dorms. I immediately thought of Chuck Young, and then you brought up his name and everybody knows when you talk about Commodores and Chuck Young, you probably talking about something having to do with snoring or scaring people because that was a few specialties. So I thought about that and and when I was in my internship, it was still common dorms at Station 3 and.

Bill

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Right.

Jason

Even as the new guy, you were told Chuck's going to keep you up snoring, and it's OK to throw a pillow at him if you have to shut him up.

Bill

That's alright. Yeah, we we had some good times, my wife and. I I was married twice and and my current wife Claudia. We've been married almost 50 years. And. We bought a house on day Rd. above the college and then when we moved in, Dave Hilti actually lived right next door. He bought the house next door but we didn't know it until we moved in. I thought we were David and I were next door neighbors and then we ended up working together on the same shift part of the time. It's station 3.

Peter

So, Bill, you went through all the ranks except for maybe the C1 rank. What what? What was your favorite position? What which did you enjoy the most?

Bill

And. I really enjoy being an engineer. I got a lot out of that cause of my mechanical background, I think. I approached my whole job and career as trying to learn everything I could. Because when I came on because of the dispatching and stuff, there are a lot of different things that you did as a firefighter at station 1. And I wanted to have a reputation that if they needed somebody to come in and work overtime, that they would think, well, Bill knows how to do that. And so I kind of went that way and then because of my mechanical background, I understood the engineer position and the testing. And hydraulics and stuff. So I would teach when I was new, I was helping to. Help the firefighters who were senior to me that were taking the engineers test to be successful because I wasn't yet allowed to take the test. For the first, I think two or three years you couldn't test for an engineer.

Peter

So you you were the. So this is actually ringing a bell in my mind. So you were the in the the technical guy, the guy who knew how everything worked could probably fix anything. It sounds like the firemen were coming to you who are senior to you to to figure out how to pass the engineer exam. You know who that reminds me of? Jason.

Jason

Tony.

Peter

Go ahead. Say yeah, Tony though. Yeah. I'm like, you're Tony Hill. You you were the Tony Hill before Tony Hill existed.

Jason

No. Yeah.

Bill

Yeah, I actually it's funny because I I was training chief. Uh, well, when Dennis Downs was hired as Chief, I was a Battalion Chief, a chief commander, and he moved me in to be training chief. And so I did. The backgrounds on the medics we hired in the beginning.

Speaker

Hmm.

Bill

So I I did the background on clap clapping. I'm Matt on Matt Brock. Tony Hill Mike Brown, who left us and went somewhere else. And and me, you know. And we had a a female paramedic from Seal Beach who was just. Head and shoulders. Excellent. Her dad was a contract. After and so during the training Academy, she could outdo all the guys. Because you know how to do everything and use leverage. It was really kind of funny because we're doing over the side rescue and driving picks into the ground. The use of the the anchor point and and she could swing a sledgehammer better than any of the other new guys. It was funny.

Jason

One of the other things you mentioned is driving solo to calls, and I remember hearing stories about that, especially at Station 5. If you or station one, if you were the junior guy, they they had enough personnel to. If it was, you know, in the middle of the night and it was just a fire alarm or a phone off the hook, the captain would just say, hey, go check that out by yourself and call us if it's.

Speaker

Right.

Bill

Right. Yeah. Don Saunders was a great guy, he. He built me a model of a Seagram's engine out of aluminum.

Jason

I remember that very cool.

Bill

And and and when he retired, we had a retirement party for him up in the Royal Verde Park and. And Claudia and I came back because we were living here and we. Everybody who had an engine that he made a model engine for brought them all, so we displayed them all at his retirement.

Peter

Do you have that engine behind you somewhere or no?

Bill

It's in the other room, but I could.

Peter

Grab it. Yeah. Grab it. I think it'll be fun to fun to make a clip out of it. Be like a homage to Don Saunders. I remember him making one for Brian Gordon. I think when I was.

Bill

If you want.

Peter

There on overtime that never were.

Jason

All the way up till he retired. You made him? Yeah.

Peter

And then we had to deal with that big old pile of aluminum out back after he was gone years later. I mean, years later that we finally did something with it, I think.

Jason

Yeah, we could probably clip this part in into this episode, but my story about Saunders is, I'm sure Bill remembers this. Look at that thing. That's cool.

Speaker

Oh wow.

Peter

He was such a Craftsman.

Bill

Yeah, he and I, when he he started I I worked at Station 4. For a while. And did what he was doing in building stuff because when went medic, we would get a new engine and we would fabricate the shelving and everything so it would fit the equipment.

Speaker

Hmm.

Bill

And so he and I worked on that stuff a lot together. But this thing the ladder comes off. And and swings down.

Peter

Crazy, yeah.

Bill

Though he spent a lot of time making it for me, and then he he put a sticker on it. And it says designed and built by Dondo. Rebel rag can see.

Peter

I gotta I. I got a Don Saunders story to tell once you come back to us. So I'm a brand new fireman. I would think I was doing oh, he was at four. I was probably working for you, Jason. He was always on the keto. Keto Atkins. What? Atkins. Right. Yeah. So. So all he wanted to do was eat meat. And I was like, I was gonna cook. And I'm like, I'll cook, you know? And he starts telling me about all his dietary things. And I'm like, oh, boy. OK, well, this is going to be interesting.

Jason

Yep, Yep.

Peter

So I I I don't know, Bill. You don't probably know this, but I love to cook like I'm all about cooking and whatnot. So I was like, OK, you're on this thing. I'm gonna make. We're gonna still gonna make mashed potatoes. You're gonna eat. But I made him out of cauliflower, but still with a conceived eat butter and bacon. And like all the terrible things I had no problem with that. But if it was like a carpet, it was the enemy. But anyway, so I made him these cauliflower mashed potatoes, and they tasted literally just like mashed potatoes. And that was it. I had won him over for life, and he'd never every time I saw him, he wouldn't stop talking about those.

Speaker 4

Right.

Peter

Cauliflower mashed potatoes but. That's it. That's just not very good, but.

Jason

I actually remember that him talking about that about you as well, from way back when I was never quite as good of a firefighter after you worked for me that. Day, yeah.

Peter

Where is he at? Do you talk to? Him. Bill. Ever.

Bill

He's in Nevada as far as I know, and I still am in touch with uh Manny Torres. Who worked for us for a while, and then he went to Santa Monica and became a chief officer there. And then he retired and he moved up to Chicago outside of Chicago and was the chief of a Volunteer Fire Department up there for a couple of years. But he got miss surfing. And he came back, and now he's he's up in Los Osos.

Speaker

Hmm.

Bill

And then we're still in touch with Kenny Hess and. Gordon Hebert, who retired. Probably 10 years before I did, he came on in. Uh. Late 50s and he retired about 98 or so, and he was my engineer at Station 6 before he retired Kenny Kenny Hess was the engineer at station one on sea shift when I got hired. He had just or he just made engineer, right when I got hired. And uh, Lindy Baum. Was the captain that did the mechanical work with Ken Hess? So then Kenny took over in charge of that, and then I was kind of more of the worker bee for the mechanical stuff.

Peter

Was was has said a a controversial figure in his career at all or no.

Bill

No, he, he, he. He learned on the job. How to be a better supervisor. I think in the beginning there were some issues where he didn't like the way some things happened. Like as an example. It's kind of a funny story. We're going down and doing the inspection of the the Crown. What the Crowne Plaza now used to be a Holiday Inn and it had the revolving restaurant. I don't know if the restaurant still revolves there or not, but we're there on a fire inspection of the whole building with the manager. So. They wanted to go out and look at the roof. And look at the access. So Kenny and the manager go out and the door to the roof closes and there's just a little teeny tiny window in this door and nobody else had gone out and Kenny's out there talking to the manager, and they're locked out. They can't get back in the building. So they and then we see them looking through the glass. And. And Ken seemed to be a little agitated. And we finally figure out that they're locked out because we didn't realize they were locked out. And then we opened the door and he was pretty angry. So it was on a Sunday. And we went back to the station. We ended up painting the administrative offices that afternoon.

Peter

It was that like punishment for locking them up.

Bill

Well, it felt like punishment because it wasn't scheduled ahead of time and the chief officers at old station one, the Fire Chief, had his own office, a separate office. And then there was a office box. His. And then there was office space for two more desks. And so the three chief officers occupied those offices. And this is something I'll tell you this story. This is a pretty funny story where I'm on duty and we're there. And it's like Barry Simmons. I can't remember his. Kramer was his last name and he was a firefighter. That was only there. Uh, probably five years when I worked there and then he he quit and moved up north. But we were having a training class and there was a. A big room next behind the administrative offices and then it went from that room to the dining room, and then the kitchen. At the old. Station one and that bigger room was a meeting room where where we used it for training for another engine would come down there and we'd have two engines there. During during on duty training. So we're there in a training class and we hear a scuffle on the other side of the Chiefs officers doors and then the door flies open and two assistant chiefs come into the room and one has the other one in the headlock. And it's hitting him in the face.

Jason

It's a different time.

Bill

So and they were shocked then to see us there. And the fight kind of, we kind of broke the fight up and then there was some yelling and screaming and stuff. But I will never forget that. That's something that most fire department, most firefighters never see.

Peter

I feel like, yeah, I feel like you guys resolved conflicts a little bit different back then.

Bill

Yeah, yeah.

Jason

So you you reminded. Me of some of these story and I I have a couple of questions for you that.

Speaker

Sure.

Jason

How did? First of all, how did you get calls? So obviously there were there were payphones. Did did payphones make a lot of your calls? Were there any leftover of those pull boxes when you got hired from before your time that you had to respond to, you went to those?

Bill

Yes. As well, there were probably, I would say 15 pull boxes around town.

Jason

Did was a lot.

Bill

And then switch.

Jason

Of your calls generated by those.

Bill

Some not too many really. It was interesting.

Speaker

OK.

Bill

Uh, we had a few rescue calls from the phone on the pier. With people in the water having trouble or something, or about having trouble, it was an interesting time because we joined with the port district and actually operated a fire boat in the harbor. And that was part of the duties of the people at Station 2 at the time. And we were responsible for three miles out into the ocean. And then the Coast Guard took it from three miles further out. And we had we go on a lot of boat accidents where people didn't really know what they were doing, getting into our harbor. When there were big waves or big swells because you almost have to pair, you have to come in from the north and make a turn in and a lot of people that weren't experienced would try and come in from the South. South and they'd be paralleling the waves. And then? Lose power or make a mistake, and especially the sailboats, and then they would be in trouble.

Peter

I think that's.

Jason

Still a big problem in Ventura. It's a very difficult harbor to navigate.

Bill

Yeah.

Jason

So same same kind of question what? What was your? Call volume like in general, how many calls per day would you get, say in the 80s? And the 70s.

Bill

Well, in the in the late 70S, station two was the Nice, busiest station in the United States. Ohh wow. Because of the size of their district. Because they went second in for Engine 1 engine 3 and they also went all the way down to the harbor and. And all the way out there until station five came in. It would be the kind of split between 3:00 and 2:00, or if two was, if it was further South, three would go. But when we only had the four stations and then the closest county station at that time was out, I think it's station. 25 or I don't know what number it is now, but it it it was out east of us. And then I worked there. When we opened station 5. And now? That was probably 75 or six or something like that. And at the time, Virgil Jones was at at Chief, he was hired for a year as acting chief. After Dean Schultz retired. And he and that was the station. And we had a the pole and Chief Jones came out there with a linen suit on and slid down the pole. And there was no pad at the bottom at the time because it wasn't open yet. And we were over there doing some work to the building and get moving things in, getting ready to occupy the station. So he he went down really fast because he had no his hands were the only skin touching the pole and he wasn't. He wrapped his arm around it, but with the linen suit, it didn't grip very well.

Peter

Didn't matter. Did he get? Hurt.

Bill

Uh, he said he didn't. But he was kind of limping a little when he walked away.

Speaker

Hi.

Speaker 4

I'm Austin folk, an engineer with the Ventura City Fire Department. I'm also on the board of the Ventura Fire Foundation, an organization that supports firefighters and their families. The foundation produces this podcast as part of. Our mission, our work. With the foundation, because I was witnessed to the help that it was able to provide. My family, the foundation, needs your help first. Please subscribe and rate this podcast on your podcast platform. This helps us get a higher ranking and more visibility for the show. Second, if you support the podcast and the foundations work, please consider donating. Every dollar helps us support firefighters and their families. There's a link in the show notes where you can donate through the website at www.venturafirefoundation.org. Thank you for listening.

Peter

How did the the city decide to open up another station? Or how did that? How did about?

Bill

Well, I I think the NFPA helped. And then at the time then I think Bobby Horne became chief and he was more active on on doing things for the people. I learned a lot from him. He was my captain when I first started on sea shift, he was the captain at Station 1. And he was a really nice guy, but and really taught people a lot. I had a lot of respect for him and he worked for the city for 40 years or so.

Peter

So he just was kind of progressive and and led the.

Bill

He was he was progressive and. I didn't understand the the thinking behind some of the things he had gone to a conference and we ended up buying a a different ladder truck and. Some of it it was very interesting how it came about. It just I didn't really understand it at the time. But then later when I got more involved in the in the purchasing of things because of my background, I went to see Grace. When we bought the first Tiller ladder truck I was involved with that with meeting with the engineers and and looking at the specs and. Figuring out anything we wanted to change on it before it was built, and then I went back east with Brian Gordon and Mary Joyce, who still works for the city to do the inspection on it at the factory, the acceptance test. Thing before we they delivered it out to us. So it was a very interesting time. Another funny thing or interesting story is is when I was a new Battalion Chief, I've been on the job two weeks. And as you know, every time you promote, you're on probation for a year. And the Rodney King riots broke out in LA.

Jason

Oh wow.

Bill

And we were asked to provide 2 engines as part of a strike team with us in the county going down there and I was the duty chief and it was on a I think a Friday night or a Saturday night. And I knew all the watch commanders in the PD because we were working out of the fire administration building at the time. And so I got a hold of Ken Thompson, who was the watch commander, and I got our guys bulletproof vests. To where and then. So I borrowed those from the Police Department and I sent 2 new. The two newest engines down there. And then because they had closed cabs because the usual thing for mutual aid was we would send the OS engine. Which at the time was the open cab and the firefighter rode backwards. And was open to visual. You know people being able to see you and everything. And we had trained that. In a riot situation, if we have a line laid and we're working a fire and start taking gunshots that we are to take a axe and cut the hose and leave. And that was kind of the theory at the time and. We had had some training on on these kind of events, but not a lot. So then Kenny Hess was the assistant chief at the time and Fern Hamilton was the chief. And so the Fern Hamilton called a meeting of all the chief officers after this was over. And question me about why I did what I did and what was my thinking behind it and I was kind of in trouble for not sending the OS engine and sending the older engine, but the OS engine at the time then was still a stick shift. And I was concerned about if you're out there in a bad situation and someone shooting at you, are you going to be able to get it in the right gear if you're nervous and have to get that out of here and then a hurry or something? So I sent the closed cabs where everybody's inside, where it's harder to see if someone's trying to shoot at you so.

Jason

That's scary stuff. I think maybe Duff and Rockwood might have been a part of that. Those guys remember people talking about it at Station 5 when I worked.

Bill

Uh-huh. Yeah, I know. Bob Reedy was one of the guys they sent down there. MHM. And and he was on Engine 5. He closed cab and he was sent to long. Beach. And they had a policeman with a machine gun riding in the cab with them the whole time they were down there. And. Bob Roper, a county chief, he actually had the during that incident he was the he was. Striking commander for that strike team and somebody tried to hit him with a car and he had to jump off the side of the overcrossing. You know, not just to get away from getting hit by a car. So it was serious stuff going on, especially the first day.

Jason

Sounds like it. So one of the one of the stories you brought up earlier and I'm just going to circle back and and I know that's kind of a heavy subject, but when you talked about Don Saunders and his retirement, I forgot about this until just now. Do you remember him? Don McPherson came up to the front of the crowd and he held a cup holder. And he's holding his plastic cup holder and then he's holding the Hook Cup holder that Don Saunders made. And he goes, you know, I calculated out how many man hours and how much detail, how much time it took Don Saunders to make this cup holder. And it came out to some crazy number like $350.00 worth of man hours and metal and.

Bill

Uh-huh.

Jason

Because he put so much pride and time into everything that he did, and then he holds up this one from O'reilly's and he goes. I just bought this for $7.50 and this works just as good or something like that. That reminded me of how much pride Don put in it in there. Yeah.

Bill

Right. So back back to this riot thing. Just. So when we had that all Chiefs meeting Chief Hamilton asked me why I did what I did, and I explained to him about protecting our folks and having the engine. That's automatic that you can get out of there right now. And that ended up becoming the policy of the department. After that incident, so I felt pretty good about it.

Jason

Yeah, it's always good. When you can do something to make that make the troops safer.

Bill

Yeah.

Peter

What? Uh, I got a question for you. What? Let's talk about retirement. So obviously you retired. I, I would argue, successfully seemed to be doing really good. What? What was? What advice do you have for people that are looking at retirement in the near future? Like what tips, tricks, things. You didn't expect? What does that look like?

Bill

Oh yeah. Have a plan for what you plan on doing when you retire. Or a desire like if you want to travel or whatever. Have a goal of something. When I retired, I was still having issues. I had a lot of nerve damage and I had a bunch of surgeries on my arms, wrists and hands cause I was losing the use of them. I I have a really good retirement and. I I chalked some of my experience up to ricochet. Richard O'Shea. ACHE. He was an assistant chief. He. He befriended me when I first started, when I was there a couple of years, I got to know him and Wayne Polisky was his brother-in-law. And I got to know that two of them real well, but Rick told me when I was a a, a Battalion Chief, he told me don't don't stick around longer than you want to. If if you have a plan and you want to retire, like my retirement maxed out at age 55. It was at 2% at 55. 2% of 50 retirement. So the highest you could earn was at 55 and then after 55 it didn't go any higher. And he said when you're have a goal to retire and go, don't stay because you hear all there may be a 3% raise two years down the road. Because you don't know how long your health is going to. Test. So it's important that you enjoy your retirement. You know, I I had injuries throughout my career and my wife was great about taking care of me when I was having hard times. I had three back surgeries in a row, so each time I had to learn to walk again. And then we lived on day Rd. which is on a hill. So the only place I could walk on level ground at home was we have a patio that went all the way across the back of the house and that was poured by damage. Met who? Who knew all about concrete? Brian Gordon. There was a whole group of US, and we we poured concrete for each other. Like if if somebody was having a pour like anybody, they say, hey, I'm, I'm putting a patio in next Friday. The off duty guys would go help. And the cost was you had to buy the beer for the guys after it was done or provide beer and hamburgers or something like that. And we did it for each other. And so they, they, I I paid Damien to design it all. And we poured it together and I I helped pour Cecil Newton's driveway and. Part part of Terry Clifford's driveway up and, you know, high and we just would help each other out. I worked on a lot of people's boats and cars because of my mechanical background on the side.

Peter

I don't think you have as many trades tradespeople in the in the department anymore. I feel like that's like going away.

Jason

No, it it was.

Bill

Yeah. When I when I was hired, they looked to that a lot. Like Roger Morgenthaler built. He he sewed and designed all the hose bed covers. And when we started hiring women in the fire service in Ventura, we built the individual dorms, and that was all built by us. Hmm. We did it ourselves and framed it and plastered it and painted it and did all the work ourselves. So. It was very interesting. It was everybody had something to contribute and it was you. You got hired as a firefighter. Most of the job ended up being more medical calls and that grew more and more as time went on as our training got better. I when we started I I we had basic first aid and I went out. I went on a call where a gentleman was still alive and he had a pulse. But I could put my finger on his brachial artery and the blood was billed up behind it very slowly. And then you I let go of it, but you could hardly hear as hard or anything. So I ended up buying a stethoscope of my own, and I carried it inside my inside pocket on my. Canvas turnouts. Is when I started it was all canvas turnouts, metal helmets and. Engine two was the only engine that had a roof on the cab. Everything else was convertible, so if it was raining, you're riding in the rain and the junior man rode the tailboard. So you're ready to lay a line and and in the beginning. And then Cecil Newton fell off the tail board. Going to a call and leather straps and the strap broke. And he was laying in the street. He got a concussion and somebody stopped, fortunately, and helped him. But he was laying in the middle of Thompson Blvd. Kind of on the center line. And they didn't. And they went to the call and they got to the call and he wasn't there. And they didn't know. And and there were instances where the captain would tell the engineer to take off. And the firefighter wasn't on the tailboard yet. And that happened a few times and.

Peter

Yeah. Bill, I, because we're, we're, we're we're going to have to wrap up here pretty quick, but I want to give you an opportunity to like what what's some of your like.

Speaker

Sure.

Peter

Fondest memory or funniest story or craziest story like what are the the the what sticks out from your career that that you want to. Chair.

Bill

Well, I just. I enjoyed my time trying trying to help form the Union or help with the representation. I really enjoyed that I I just working on the equipment was fun. The people, the personalities, it was amazing to me because the. That people like. Roger Morgenthaler and. Gordon Hebert. They would bring their guitars to work and play guitar at night, and it was just really a a fun place to work. And I learned a lot. And. And then as things progressed it, they focused more on education and that became a a bigger driver. Of things and. And I think the training got a lot better and what we gave the public got a lot better as far as the service we provided. So I just enjoyed my careers like I found my niche in life of what I was meant to do. I I had a good time doing those things. I I delivered the four babies in the field. Before the ambulance was there back in the day when the ambulances came pretty far and at one point they were stationed in our stations with the medics. I I I worked through all the medics stuff and Damian Smith and Dave Healthy were the two biggest drivers of us getting medics I think. As far as doing all the background work. And then I was a shift commander at the time, and it needed more management focus. And I started doing working on that on my and representing that arm of the department on my days off. And I became the liaison to the all the hospitals in the county for our department, for the medics. And then. They then they hired Jack, was hired and from and he worked up at Montecito. And I did his background check and we hired him away and then he came in and he helped me a lot with getting things started as a medic. And then he also helped on a 40 hour week for a little while, coordinating things when we needed it, before we started hiring the EM EMS Director. For the department. So we worked our way all all through that.

Peter

Well, it sounds like you had an amazing career and you made a lot of contributions that still still are there, which is got to be a good feeling for you. Jason, anything you want to add or?

Jason

No, I just wanted to say say thanks for paving the way, kind of like you're saying, Peter, all that stuff that we're.

Bill

Ohh yeah.

Jason

Well, you know, we benefit so much from some of the stuff that you started the association, the Union, the the medics. I mean, those are huge parts of our career that we talk about and and we are involved with every single day that we go to work. So thanks for all that. And and it was really fun to to hear the the names and and some of you know the younger.

Speaker

Oh.

Jason

Years of from when I came up, the guys that were were already in the middle or the ends of their careers, that was. Fun I appreciate.

Bill

The time? Yeah. One of one of the things that was funny about the the first Academy we had that I was in for six of us and Brian Gordon was part of that too. Uh, you had to climb over the they put the weed, held the 50 foot ladder up with the poles, and you had to go over it. And that was part of the training. And you get up on that thing. And man, that thing is shaking. It was in the parking lot behind the clock tower in.

Peter

Gotta you gotta trust your your people holding the pole.

Bill

Ohh yeah, yeah, we're all in it together.

Speaker

There, huh? Sure.

Peter

Well, Bill, thank you very much for coming on. It's been a pleasure and we wish you.

Speaker

Yeah.

Peter

So long and prosperous continued retirement.

Bill

Yeah, we're we're doing good. We're enjoying it and it's a great career. I people ask me here where I live now that have kids that are want to get in the fire service, what they should do. And I tell them if they can become a paramedic because they say you can pretty much pick where you want to work. Almost decreases the demand.

Jason

Yeah.

Bill

But it's something I really cherish having done because I think it's what I was meant to do.

Peter

That's awesome. Well said. Alright, that was a nice blast from the past. He was he was not around when I got hired, so I think you you are a little more connected to him, Jason.

Jason

Yeah, he was just dealing with his back injury when I was first hired. The amount of names he threw out that. Most of them. I either worked with for a very very short time before they retired, or I never worked with them. All those kind of the last generation, but it was fun to hear those names and have them connected to kind of what they were doing. The other thing you brought up. The station one having its own dispatch. We still have some of those relics at Station 1 where they have those. Those operator plugs where you plug it into the desk depending on which which station you have to wake up and tone out and dispatch. So it's kind of cool that those are still there. The clock tower in that used to be stationed one and I don't know how many of the new guys. Even know that? But that was a fire station in downtown. Now that's just the hotel and a restaurant. And then the other thing we talked about off Air Pete was how history repeats itself. Right. So we have squads out of Fire Station 3 now. Now, and he was talking about the ambulances out of Station 3. And it's funny to hear the amount of personnel those five guys hasn't really changed.

Peter

Yeah. The other thing I found interesting was how he, well, he was a mechanic because they wanted him to work on the engines. Think that the fire service in general used to do more stuff internally back then. I don't know if it was. As the city wasn't as developed or or like, they didn't have the depth and personnel or infrastructure, or if it was just, they didn't run enough calls and they had to find stuff for them to do so they just started tacking on a bunch of extra stuff, but. From what I can tell, it's like slowly they start taking stuff away. Like OK, we don't need you to be the mechanics anymore. Very similar to how it's like, OK, we don't need you to paint the fire hydrants anymore. We got people who are going to paint the fire hydrants like. I wonder what this will look like, you know, 50 years from now what those guys will be doing, you know?

Jason

Yeah, you're kind of specializing at this point. We once we get empts, they don't have time to do some of that stuff. And now we're paramedics and we don't have time, you know, and. They have a fire prevention Bureau now, so it is different. You also brought up that there's less hiring of the trades in general and we talked about that a lot when we interviewed Tammy crudo also and how we missed some of that stuff because there is a lot that they bring because you never know what kind of call you're going to go on. And sometimes that background is really useful too.

Speaker 4

Yeah.

Peter

Yeah. Yeah, well, very good. Thanks. As always, Jason. And hopefully we have people share this. It'd be awesome if we could get this into the hands of some of the retired people that he mentioned because I don't know how much how many people from that generation are listening to the podcast. So if you know, somebody send it to them, definitely leave a review. Share it it it definitely helps us get the word out. We're obviously trying to extend and build our.

Jason

Listener fit.

Peter

Listenership viewership. I don't know what the right word is for that, but anyhow.

Jason

I like it. I like it that's going to be the word from now on. Listenership. Yeah, like great and share and whatever podcast platform you're listening on. Thanks, Pete. Have a good week. We'll see you soon.

Peter

Alright, you too.