{"id":122672,"date":"2019-09-16T07:45:05","date_gmt":"2019-09-16T12:45:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thevwindependent.com\/news\/?p=122672"},"modified":"2019-09-17T07:33:54","modified_gmt":"2019-09-17T12:33:54","slug":"community-helps-celebrate-vwfds-150th-anniversary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2019\/09\/16\/community-helps-celebrate-vwfds-150th-anniversary\/","title":{"rendered":"Community helps celebrate VWFD’s 150th"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

DAVE MOSIER\/<\/strong>independent editor<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was 1869. The Civil War had only been over four years. That\u2019s when Van Wert\u2019s four independent ward fire brigades decided to join together to form a citywide fire department. On Saturday, city firefighters celebrated the department\u2019s 150 years of existence with an open house at the fire station.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Van Wert Fire Chief Jon Jones talks to visitors to the VWFD’s 150th anniversary celebration Sunday in front of the department’s first steam fire engine at the fire station. <\/strong>Bob Barnes\/Van Wert independent<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe had an open house because the fire department belongs to the community, and we wanted to give back to everyone,\u201d said Fire Chief Jon Jones. \u201cWe wanted to have a celebration of the department\u2019s 150 years of service and have our community be a part of that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chief Jones got his wish, as hundreds of people came out to help the department celebrate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The department begin its celebration with a 5K run, while there were also fire truck rides, a station where children could dress in fire gear, equipment displays, including the city\u2019s first steam fire engine and hose rack from Central Insurance Company\u2019s Fire Museum, a tour of the firehouse, and a number of demonstrations of firefighting and other skills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe fire department performs many functions beside firefighting and advance life support EMS,\u201d Chief Jones noted. \u201cOur personnel train to provide the best emergency services we can\/.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The fire chief said that, in addition to firefighting and EMS training, city firefighters are trained in high angle rescue, vehicle extraction, water rescue, ice rescue, hazardous materials handling, grain bin rescue, confined space rescue, fire inspections, and providing information to the public.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Saturday, firefighters demonstrated a number of those skills, including high-angle rope rappelling rescue, auto extrication (with hands-on participation by community members), and forcible entry to gain access to a locked building. Activities also included a race to see how fast firefighters could don their turnout gear, and a movie on the fire department\u2019s history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Firefighters also provided hot dogs, popcorn, and cotton candy to those who attended the open house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chief Jones said he was \u201cblown away\u201d by the community response.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was such a great day seeing our community there and seeing all the children having a great time,\u201d he said. \u201cAt the end of the day, our department couldn\u2019t be happier with the outpouring of support shown by Van Wert.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following the open house, the department also held a dinner for retirees.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DAVE MOSIER\/independent editor It was 1869. The Civil War had only been over four years. That\u2019s when Van Wert\u2019s four independent ward fire brigades decided to join together to form a citywide fire department. On Saturday, city firefighters celebrated the department\u2019s 150 years of existence with an open house at the fire station. \u201cWe had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-122672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-01 10:45:56","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=122672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122672\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}