A local firehouse and the people who created it will be celebrating their 40th anniversary this weekend, and are inviting everyone to join them.

An open house will be held from noon to 3 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 22 at the Northside Fire Department’s main fire station, located at 209 Bear Branch Road in Rockingham. Come on down and meet the all-volunteer crew who protects and serves the community. Refreshments will be served, and folks can tour the fire house.

A lot has changed since a group of neighbors originally got together back in 1980 to discuss a major void in their community – fire protection.

“”In the beginning, as it is now, the community support was fantastic,” explained one of the station’s founding fathers Terry Shaw. “We didn’t have much money, and we were paying for materials out of our own pockets.”

Some land was donated for the first fire station, and then the guys got to work. “We had a lot of skilled people who helped make this happen.” said Shaw. “We built it all ourselves.”

It wasn’t until several years later that the department became a legal taxing district so they could be funded through a portion of the property taxes assessed on owners within the fire district’s boundaries.

“We were a pretty rural area then,” said Shaw. “We all would meet at the church, trying to get organized,”

But when the group asked for volunteers to fight fires, the response was huge. “We probably had 30 guys volunteer,” he said, “and we didn’t even have a truck yet.”

That came next. The department purchased a 1949 pumper. “We got the truck before we got the place to put it built,” Shaw remembers.

Today, about the same amount of volunteers still work as firefighters for the fire district, but they now have a lot more trucks, equipment and training. “To be a volunteer today it takes a lot of commitment. You have to go through a lot of schooling and training, and that never stops,” he said.

The old, original fire house is no longer in use, but it’s still standing. One of the local residents bought the property and are preserving the fire house, Shaw said.

The district now has two fire houses to better service its expanded area.

To learn more about Northside, stop by Saturday’s open house. The crew would love to meet you.

https://www.yourdailyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/web1_Northside2.jpg

https://www.yourdailyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/web1_Northside3.jpg

The original firefighting crew at Northside back in 1980.
https://www.yourdailyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/web1_Northside1.jpgThe original firefighting crew at Northside back in 1980.
Northside celebrating 4 decades of fire protection

Robert Leininger

Editor

Reach Robert Leininger at [email protected]