Elizabeth Township Fire Department celebrating a century of service

The celebration begins at 6 tonight at the Boston Spectrum.

A century of service and community dedication is a milestone worth celebrating.

And, starting today, the Elizabeth Township Fire Department is going to do just that.

The fire department will kick off its weekend centennial anniversary celebration at the Boston Spectrum with fun, games, entertainment and a firemen’s parade.

“It’s 100 years to commemorate what the previous members did to get to where we are at today,” fire Chief Adam Janosko said. “Overall, it’s going to be a big birthday party.”

The celebration starts tonight at the Boston Spectrum, located at 6001 Smithfield St., with fun for the whole family, including free trackless train rides, free bounce houses, various food vendors, games/information booths and refreshments.

There is free live music throughout the weekend. Tonight, the Lou Kampert Acoustic Show is from 6 to 10 p.m. On Friday, the Todd Jones Band will perform from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m., followed by fireworks right after, The firefighter challenge/ bucket brigade event is set for 6:30 p.m. Friday. The traditional firefighter challenge and team competition was inspired by early firefighting history before modern pumpers and fire trucks existed, where they raced to pass water down a line using buckets to fill a target barrel to a designated fill line.

According to centennial committee chairman Terry Halt, who has been a firefighter since 1979, fellow firefighters from Glassport, Blaine Hill, Rostraver Township and more will be participating.

“They are going to be dipping a bucket in a trough, bringing the bucket up, running it 12 feet, handing it to somebody on a ladder and the person has to raise up and give it to somebody in the window,” Halt said. “Then they pour the bucket in the garbage can up top, the garbage can runs down to the bottom and there’s barrels at the bottom. It’s a race to get the float to the top.”

The firemen’s parade will take place at 3 p.m. Saturday with the lineup at 2 p.m. The parade will go down Smithfield Street from Route 48 at the Boston Spectrum with different departments involved, according to Halt.

“We have two guys that are going to be marching in the parade,” Halt said. “One of them is a lieutenant from Maryland who responded to the Pentagon when the plane hit it on Sept. 11, 2001. And then we have one firefighter captain from McKeesport who will be marching in the parade, and he responded to the towers in New York.”

Also on Saturday is DJ Stan the Man from the parade’s end until 10 p.m. Live wrestling from Pros of Wrestling will start at 6 p.m.

There are several sponsors for the event as well, including Steel Strong Community Federal Credit Union, Big’s Sanitation, Elizabeth Forward School District band and more.

According to Halt, they started planning the event a year ago. He added that they have not had a celebration like this before, and this is an event that supports the members.

“If you see most of the fairs, most of the members are running around the whole time,” Janosko said. “Our administration and president wanted to do something that the members could enjoy with the community, rather than being on the other side. It’s a concept for the fire department where we can actually enjoy ourselves.”

100 years of history

According to the department’s history manuscript, written by member Dan Taylor, before Elizabeth Township had organized volunteer fire companies, protection from fire depended largely upon neighbors helping neighbors.

Bells, buckets, wells, cisterns, hand tools and improvised bucket brigades represented the resources available when a home or business caught fire, which started the tradition.

“Nobody here gets paid,” Janosko said. “We get the incentives through the school, and things like that, but almost everything here is from somebody that has donated their time to get it. There were people, back in the day as they say, that would refinance their homes to buy new stuff for the fire station or donate garages.”

Beginning in 1926, that began to change. The Industry area organized the township’s first volunteer fire company, Boston followed, then Victory, Greenock, Central and Blythedale. Buena Vista and Blaine Hill developed independent traditions of their own.

On April 26, 1926, residents gathered for the first meeting that would lead to Industry Volunteer Fire Co. In 1928, Industry purchased a new Buffalo chemical truck. Surviving notes place the purchase price at approximately $3,900, a figure that will remain subject to final source verification before publication.

Long before Elizabeth Township possessed an organized fire service, residents in the Industry area protected one another with the limited means available to them.

Industry’s charter was recorded in 1929. The surviving notes identify trustees James Bradstock, John Donnelly, and James Goldie. The company also moved toward construction of a permanent station on property associated with one of the earlier house fires remembered from the bucket- brigade era.

The early history preserved in the locally written book “Between Two Rivers” recalls a fire at the Robinson home that was fought by a bucket brigade, as well as another house fire on the property where the Industry fire station would later stand.

For most of the 20th century, these companies served distinct communities while increasingly relying upon one another through mutual aid. As the demands of emergency service changed, six of those histories eventually converged through a twenty-year consolidation process into today’s Elizabeth Township Fire Department.

Bringing in new generations

The chapters that follow in the manuscript are not simply histories of buildings and apparatus. They are histories of people.

This included the volunteers who raised money, built stations, maintained equipment, answered alarms, cared for the injured, trained the next generation, and repeatedly adapted their organizations to meet the needs of their communities.

“The fire service is a proud group of people,” said 22-year firefighter Jim Chabalie. “It makes us all proud looking back on the history that we have had here. Even though the department physically we’re celebrating an important date, even though (members) are not here, we carry their traditions on into the future.”

The legacy of the fire department lives on in many generations of firefighters within the department. Janosko’s daughter is training to be a firefighter, and many others.

Chabalie has his children, Madison and Greyson, come to the department to learn, as they want to become firefighters. A ton of the same last names go through the same departments, he added, and his family comes from a long line of firefighters.

“It’s been in my life ever since I’ve been alive,” Madison said. “I started falling in love with it as I got older, and it’s fun to run calls.”

According to Chabalie, they have to come together because volunteer numbers have dropped off.

Firefighter Roman Gardner encouraged people to come to the event. Since they are a fairly busy volunteer department, they are always there for each other, and he hoped the community would be there for them.

“With the consistency that we have at this place, when you are all stuck in it together, it kind of makes it fun,” Gardner added. “There are times that are absolutely miserable, and then there are times where maybe I’m bored or maybe we’re just having a busy day or not in a good mood. One way or another, there’s always a way to turn that around.”

Janosko said people give back to the department, and without them, they would not have been able to make it to 100 years without the donations and help from the community to offset costs and to get the support.

“Being a fireman, there’s really no high points, just low points and you just have to live with it,” Halt said. “We try to lift each other up. We’re here to service the community. That’s what we’re here for. And even this centennial, it’s serving the community and we wanted to give back to the community.”