Queenston firefighters to celebrate longstanding service to their community

This weekend, the Queenston community is invited to celebrate the 75th anniversary of its fire association, with two days of events marking the occasion.

The annual fall spaghetti dinner will be held Friday, Oct. 11 from 5 to 7 p.m., at the Dumfries Street station, and Saturday, Oct. 12 there will be an open house and barbecue, with apparatus displays and fire prevention activities.

Before the fire station was built in 1949, there was just the St. Davids fire hall, built in 1942, offering protection for the villages and rural areas in the township.

But when Lewiston firefighters had to be called to cross the suspension bridge to attack a house fire in Queenston before local trucks could arrive, it became apparent that the time had come to build a substation, a written history of the station explains.

Its first location was in an old blacksmith shop at the corner of Highland and Princess Streets, where a Model A Ford, equipped with firefighting equipment, was kept.

As call volumes grew, and more space was needed, a new station was erected, and by 1977, the third and present hall was built at the corner of Dumfries Street and the Niagara River Parkway, and what became Station 4 continues to protect the village and surrounding area of Niagara-on-the-Lake.

Every year, Queenston firefighters respond to about 125 emergencies from this station, and train 51 weeks of the year, explains volunteer firefighter Crispin Bottomley.

The Queenston Volunteer Firefighters Association is made up of members of Queenston District 4, and serves as a social organization for firefighters for the benefit of the local community, each year donating almost $5,000 toward minor sports, local local charities and other community causes.

Frank Digweed is one of the long-standing volunteers. He grew up in Queenston, across the street from the fire hall, and says when a friend of his joined as a volunteer, “I went with him to see what it was all about, and I stuck around.”

That was almost 45 years ago, and not a lot has changed, he said, other than some of the equipment, particularly, “the jaws of life, which required a new level of training in extrication.”

There has been talk of a new station — there were years “when there was nothing in the coffers for repairs,” he explains, and maintenance wasn’t always carried out when it should have been. “But it’s in good shape now. We’re happy with it, and we’d like it to stay.”

The alternative that has been discussed was one station between St. Davids and Queenston serving both villages, “but that really doesn’t make sense,” he says, referring to having to drive that much further if there is an emergency in the village, where most of the station volunteers live.

There are a total right now of 18, with a full complement being 20, he says, but there are recruits being trained “who will be graduating and coming to work next year.”

The training to become a volunteer firefighter has increased over the years and become much more intense, and continues weekly at each station.

Digweed spoke to the Local at the Queenston station before the volunteers’ regular Monday night training session recently, where retired firefighter Jake Redekop stopped by.

He’s 87 now, and had to retire in 1997, having been a volunteer at the station since 1960. At one time the age of retirement was 60 — it’s been changed to 65 since then.

There are several firefighters who have been with the department for decades, and some who had to retire as he did, or else they would still be there, but stay involved in other ways.

Redekop is the oldest surviving firefighter from Queenston, but much of what they do now has not changed from his day, he says.

In his retirement from firefighting he took on the job of looking after the house committee, which runs the social part of the association, until about a year ago when, he says, “I felt like I just couldn’t do it any more.”

But he still remains involved in association activities, and likes to stop by Monday evenings after the training is completed and station members stick around for a social time, he says.

The greatest change in his time, he says, are the trucks. “They used to be all standard. Until the 70s and 80s there were no automatics.” Plus the station now has two trucks.

As a St. Davids School student, and then when he worked at a corner gas station in St. Davids after high school in Stamford, “I’d see the guys come to St. Davids (fire station) for meetings,” he says, speaking about what drew him to sign up as a volunteer.

He tells the story of being nearby when a serious accident occurred in Queenston. A young boy going down the hill in Queenston on his bike, by what was then Laura Secord Memorial School, couldn’t stop — his brakes failed, and he hit and shattered a wall of glass at the school, which cut his juggler vein. Redekop was sure the boy was going to bleed to death. "I knew I had to cut off the bleeding. I was trying to hold it in,” he says.

When help arrived, he was told he had saved the boy’s life, “and that felt pretty good. I wanted to keep doing things like that, and I thought what better way than by joining the fire department.”

Deralyn Mackenzie, awarded in April for 35 years of service, was the first female to join the department, and “for the most part I was treated like everyone else,” she says.

She was taken on as a volunteer after completing her training as a paramedic and being hired by the region, and discovered early on her medical skills were useful as a volunteer firefighter. Stepping in to help in medical emergencies contributed to earning her acceptance as a firefighter, she says — her skills were appreciated by the volunteers, who didn’t receive a lot of medical training.

She has now retired from a 37-year career as a paramedic, continuing to find personal fulfillment from her role as a firefighter with the Queenston station, and hopes to for years to come.

There have been some challenges along the way, though, including being told early on in her pregnancy she had to take time off, and at one point, was told not to come on to the fire station property. “It hasn’t all been a bed of roses, but things have changed for the better.”

She continues to want to give back to the community, she says, “and this is how I do that.”

Sylvain Brillon, the Queenston district 4 fire chief, has been with the department 25 years, time that has gone by in “the blink of an eye,” he says.

At the time he signed up, he was a musician and a French teacher, as well as writing short stories for CBC about living in a small town. He decided to write about the fire station “to see what it was all about, and that’s what got me into this.”

Now, at 62, he has been a professional fire training officer for another municipality for the last 21 years.

As the Queenston station chief, he remains connected “24/7,” he says, the same as every volunteer firefighter who also has a full-time jobs, some of them as professionals with other fire departments.

That connectivity is essential for a good response time, for all the volunteers, says Brillon.

“It’s an obligation. When the pager goes off and I’m available, I go. There is no such thing as a routine call. You have to expect the unexpected. And I pride myself with being the first one at a call.”

The annual Spaghetti Dinner on Friday, Oct. 11 is from 5 to 7 p.m., and is all you can eat at the station, 5 Dumfries St., with takeout available. Adults are $14, children $6, with proceeds supporting local organizations and charities.

Saturday, Oct. 12, the open house and barbecue to celebrate the station’s 75th anniversary is 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. It will include apparatus displays and fire prevention activities.

An evening trivia fundraising event is already sold out.