40th Anniversary: Writing the Back Page

My journey with Firehouse Magazine began early in my FDNY career when I had around 5 years on the job. I was by that time assigned to Rescue 3, which was quartered along with E-93, TL-45 and the 13^th Battalion in Washington Heights in upper Manhattan. It was quite a busy firehouse, with three companies and a battalion chief responding to thousands of runs a year.

At lunch and dinner, 20 firefighters and officers sat at three or four tables. It was busy. Along with the 75 or so firefighters who worked there, we also had several regular visitors who rode out with Rescue and watched us work fires, extrications and various other emergencies and disasters. Harvey Eisner, the editor of Firehouse, was a fixture there, and after a while I got to know him. Harvey was a man of few words and was a great photographer, too. He would shoot hundreds of photos and often shared them with the men in Rescue.

One day Harvey came up to me and asked if I would be interested in writing an article for the magazine. I was quite shocked by the offer and also quite unfamiliar with any type of writing. I explained to him that I was just a young fireman with little experience and maybe some of the older, more experienced guys would have more to write about.

A few weeks later, he asked me again and made a few suggestions about topics and gave me a few tips on how to assemble a simple article. I eventually accepted the challenge (and it was a challenge!), and my decades-long association with Harvey and Firehouse began.

I remember some of those early single-page articles and how nervous I was that they were accurate and informative. Articles about power-saw operations, hoseline stretching and search were just a few of my early contributions. I rarely received any feedback from readers, but I continued to contribute and started to enjoy writing.

I remember talking with FDNY Deputy Chief Vincent Dunn about how to write a good article and his advice was priceless. Much later, after getting to know him, he became Vinny! After a while—and I honestly don’t remember how long it was—Harvey invited me to make a presentation at Firehouse Expo. I was thrilled and, of course, I accepted and began working on a program.

There was no PowerPoint back then, so the program was literally written down on a pad and then a camera had to be used to take photos to illustrate the points. Of course, the photos had to be transformed into 35mm slides so they could be assembled into the plastic carousel that fed them into the projector. If you wanted a text slide with words rather than pictures, they too needed to be made in to slides. (Just typing this reminds me how difficult this was.) I guess the programs went well because I continued to be invited to write for the magazine and present at the Expo.

Writing on a regular basis for Firehouse Magazine has given me the opportunity to express my opinions, emphasis issues and operations that I thought were important and have a generally positive impact on the American fire service. It also allowed me to meet a wide variety of fire service personnel from across the country, many of whom have become good friends. I have developed friendships with firefighters from Miami-Dade, Chicago, Philadelphia, Jersey City, Worcester, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Syracuse, Providence, Portland, Baltimore, Boston, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and many, many more. Sharing stories and talking shop with these guys over the years have been some of the most rewarding and exciting experiences in my career, and presenting at Firehouse Expo, Firehouse World and Firehouse On-the-Road has always been rewarding and fulfilling.

For the past 9 years, I have been fortunate enough to write the back-page column, The Fire Scene, where I try to educate, entertain and encourage our readers through my stories and lessons. Trying to keep my work to the 800 words that fill the single page is not always easy but usually ends up being sufficient.

Many thanks to the loyal readers of Firehouse Magazine and the throngs of attendees who come out for Expo and World. Keep on training, keep on reading, and I’ll see you on the back page!