Editor’s note: Tom Brennan, our revered technical editor and former editor, passed away in April 2006. Tom shared monthly here his wisdom and knowledge of the tactical aspects of our industry, but he also wrote about the social side of the fire service as only Tom could. We are very pleased that Tom wrote down some of these interesting, funny, insightful, and colorful stories. We are very proud to have the chance to continue to provide for you the random thoughts of our dear friend and brother. Please note Tom did not change any of the names, as he felt none of his friends mentioned in these pieces are “innocent.”
“I can’t believe how easy it was to get to this roof,” my mind meandered as I “popped” out of the scuttle to the roof adjoining the fire building.
It was a hot afternoon, and the streets were busy with all sorts of “stuff” for us to be called to. They called us for everything-I guess because they thought that no one else would come. They were right, of course. The ambulances working in the City of New York in the 1960s were relatively unsupervised, and the estimated time of arrival to an emergency, at least when called by us, was always anywhere from 40 minutes to never. The police were always busy, and you actually had to know what level of response you had to make to the phone operator to spark a move to the top of the dispatcher’s list. Calling the fire department, however, always put you on the “top of someone’s list,” and your call was minutes away from being transmitted to the firehouses at worst.
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