GETTIN' SALTY EXPERIENCE PODCAST Ep. 236 | FDNY LT. ED GERAGHTY

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We'd like to know before the start of this interview that the opinions about to be expressed by the guest of tonight's Getting Salty Experience Podcast are that of the guest and do not directly or necessarily reflect the views of the host of the Getting Salty Experience Podcast.

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Hello, Hello, Rouffie Referano, Oh, where oh, where is my body tonight?

It's not him sitting there. He's a good looking guy, but that's not Ruffie, as you know, is Senior dude, Hank Muley filling it for my boy Ruffy Mikey Cologne on the wheels of steel, filling in for Gonzo, who's on another cruise. That guy does more cruising. I've never seen somebody more cruises than this night, Hank.

That's that Chief's money.

That's oh, he's a big chief. I forgot right, dice for filling in last minute, Senior dude. Appreciate your pleasure.

Hello, Hello, all my buddies out in leather head Nation and basically Coolause all you did was you replaced one old guinea with an older good point.

Yeah, we waped swats, but Yeah, that's it. Yeah, we got a univerishment on tonight though. Man, yeah salty. You know you say the word getting salty. What do you think, Hank in a pre show? This guy is salty, right absolutely. I don't want to tell him he got on the year that I was born. I'll save that until he comes in here. But guy's been just a bit. I think this is the first time we had a from like one of the original Squad Squad five.

He's has a great career, which everybody's gonna hear between all the things he's done.

And I think he's gone to a fire or two. I'll go out there and say I go on a limb and say that yep, educating. Yeah. AnyWho, let's keep Roofy in our press. And he had a little you had a little brush. I don't want to see with the Grim Reaper. But I kept telling him to stay away from the light, little buddy, don't go to the light, stay away from the light. He Uh, he had a

I'm sure whatever this is, you'll pick it down the road A little bit.

Back, said you know, I mean we're friends forty almost forty three years with buddies. Now, man, that's a long time to be friends with. Somebody can't he can't go no way yet, keep on a while.

You sound like you're giving him one foot in the grave already. Get he's going to be flying.

I told him, I said, good things. His daughter just got accepted to a really good college. And you're not taking a dirt nap, I said, So, I mean you got everything go for us, right.

This is what happens when you get when you retired, things happen, and it's just from one doctor's appointment to the next doctor's appointment, right, and you play golf in between.

And know when you hang out with your friend, you're talking about everything that hurts you. Oh yeah, this is killing me.

Oh ship, yeah, you got a good Yeah, you know that's what I go to the retired meetings down here.

By the end of up meeting, it's hey, you got a good doctor for the eyes. I got a lump over here and I got to get chucked down. I gotta get my knee replaced. Who's had that done? You know that's what it is. That's me that's coming up soon, miss the show. I'll do it. Yeah, whatever works.

Bro from the hospital.

Band baby, I'll do it from the hospital. But when you get your knees done, you may be two or three inches taller. I'm hoping, God, that would be great, wasn't it? Wow? You know I hope that happens. Came over a two week ride on a horse like definitely. From people who see me in person, it looks like one need's going this way, one need's going this way. What's the best. Hey, let's get to all commercials because I'm excited to get the lieutenant and Garrity in here.

All right, word first from our friends over at New Jersey Fire.

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You gotta love the brothers out there. Look at this standing up and shoes.

Cleanini's in there too, He's like.

They killing each other. Yeah, all right, let's play the albatough really quick and then we'll bring in lieutenant.

All right, hang on a second. It seems to find it here in a que. Armor Tough coming up. Need a new floor for your fire station shoes An Armor Tough interlocking flooring system to cover your aging, stained, crack, concrete or POxy floor around for nearly twenty years and proven to be the best choice in renovating your station floors,

Excellent, And like we told you, my man Vince, they give you the giant logo on your floor free fireman's favorite word, hank free. Yeah, call up, my man, Vince said, I'm a tough and get yourself a full They even put one in a gym. Did you see that, Mike? Yeah, yeah, I was gonna ask Gay Fox about that, but he wouldn't know anything about the jym Oh shot fired on Gay Fox. All right, let's get him in here. Let's get him to coming to the stage. This is my say.

Thank you.

Guys, sit back, get your shopping up, your pencils, and listen to this magas you want to talk about fire duty. This man has seen some fire duty, but let's start the way back. Let's go back a little bit to the early days of Lieutenant and Garrett. He grew up in Queens and says here right, oh, time out, Mike, thank you. I gotta I gotta put a pause on here. We gotta get patriotic. I'm very sorry. I am remissed. Sorry. You do what, Mike.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic, for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice.

For all wonderful, best country in the whole wide world. Now we can get into it. Little let's go back to Queens. Let's turn back the way back machine. How far are we going back?

Well, at the beginning Long Island City is they quit the projects, the Queen's Bridge projects. That's where I actually grew up until I moved to Astoria.

A tough neighborhood, Queen's bridg projects.

Back in the day. It's it was, it was. It was a crazy place there. It was starting to get real crazy there, but it.

Were still with projects, big family.

Uh yeah. Then we moved to uh to uh story around off dit Mars thirty first Street, with the l ended down in department houses there, and uh, it was great neighborhood to grow up, and a lot.

Of grits back the well they came in afterwards.

Now afterwards, and now it's very it's international, and it's all it's all young kids there today today who can afford it? It's so expensive.

Yeah, it's right outside the city there, so it's an easy commute right to Manhattan.

Story is, it's a great place there. And and again that's where I was appointed in sixty eight. Well, I got a pointed a job in November thirty at sixty eight, but we got a assigned to Angine two sixty.

Three, which is right in your neighborhood.

And it really was at the time because I stayed I got married, I still stayed in the neighborhood there. I was literally walking to work there, you know.

But you worked with Connet before that, right.

Yeah, before what year you get to content sixty one? Maybe, uh, nineteen sixty, nineteen sixty and then uh, all you said, I got that phone call that in the office. Dad, he called me up and the guy says, you want the job, kid? And then what job was he talking about? Because at that time. They were given a fire department. They given police department, examed every Saturday. They needed so many guys. They didn't charge it at all. You just walk into any of these places, take the test, and

Oh, good, good timing.

Yes, it was very good timing for that.

Would you have taken the p D if it was p D?

I think I would have. Then. You know what I was. I was too short. You had to be five eight? How dare they? I would have made it either you had to be five eight. They didn't change that till uh many years later.

Really do we did we?

Hat?

Did we ever have a height requirement in the five part? I think they did.

I'm pretty sure I don't think they they did.

Well, not even back in the day I thought I thought they did have it might it might have been five six or something, but maybe not you.

Maybe maybe it was. Yeah, there was a well we went to Provy School in Welfare Island.

So it wasn't even at the Rocket. It was Welfare.

It wasn't the Rocket. It was it was Welfare Island. And I don't remember too much doing too much isand it was only like four weeks maybe nothing.

So so look back Welfare Island was was it was that the tip of it was about the island or was the whole island back then?

No, it was, it was it was this separate island there, you know.

And but then you have to take to take the bridge to get onto fifteen.

Uh.

I had to ask somebody that make a phone call the other day that you came in through Queen's I believe through.

Twenty first Avenue there or something and you right, yeah.

Right past the engine two sixty right and then rove over the bridge there I believe, so far back I don't even remember it.

But that was still close to you too, I mean for Welfare, I was close to a storeia.

Yeah that was you. I don't hear anybody commute. Nobody really commuted that far. It seemed at the time, you know, everybody lived local.

Right, what made you want to take the test? You said you had no family on the job. Right.

Of course one of the other guys had taken it. You know, they grew up in the building there was it was like ten buildings all attached. I mean, you had like fifty guys there, you know, so a couple of us took it. Everybody went every which way, you know, right, It wasn't like you have private dwellings and you don't. You don't know who the other people are and next door to you. But when they finished Proby school, they told you you have to go to your local firehouse

Wow, you know.

And Becky was the guy with the president standing on top of the car and wow.

Yeah.

So we were friends all through the years, you know, just working with him and all that. And and he couldn't it couldn't happened to a nicer guy. What happened to him? He traveled all over the world as an emissary for the fire department.

Did the other guy go to to sixty three?

Yeah, he went to sixty two. I believe the other guy the road and uh, but that was beck With That's so he only passed away a year ago. Maybe Yeah, he's some he was some character. But so that's how we became friendly with him, you know.

So that was one. Seventeen was the truck, Because.

When seventeen was the truck?

Were they did they have the wall there were they step back then.

They had the wall and all that, so we were it's a great house. All guys are great. A lot of old timers in the house. And then they started the interchange where you were. Every third night we went up to the Bronx, so the Cosa Kaka that's that's what they called it. The guys, and uh, yeah, it's sometimes you know, there's a lot of guys didn't Some guys didn't want to go up there, you know, like

As a young guy on the job, did you did you enjoy going up there because of because of the fire duty.

Were you looking to do that.

Yeah, yeah, it just it was a different world. It was a different world than we were used to. And we had a couple of young guys that liked to go up so, uh, you know we went up there when we put in the mutual, we take a mutually just to go up there.

You know, right, I was going to ask, did you see like the young guys would grab a mutual so they could go up to the bronx to try to catch from Yeah.

They did. We really enjoyed it and all the stories you heard about it, and you know, forty two trucks was a nice, nicer place with seventy three and the squad there. It was just crazy. The the the dishwasher used to empty right on the floor. The cabinets, none of them my doors on it.

Uh.

Some of the old timers there who us, they would never sit on a couch or anything. They never went up to the bunk room. They just sat on a hard chair like those school chairs, you know. And uh, it's been the night. There went a lot of fires.

Just you remember your first fire in two sixty three.

Actually the first fire had it was an accident under Grand Central Parkway where a couple of people died, you know, and I guys doing like CPR on people. Uh, just before we used to do it with the cfr D or anything. And uh, that was I mean, it was pretty bad that one. And the fire, it was just a basic fire. Had nothing to remember, you know, it was just that small house fire in any area there. But it's a great house. The guys were great, right,

What what did you guys have? What kind of read had?

We had a regular pumper? Yeah? Where did you get that? I don't know where they got that picture from.

I sent it. I sent it to mine. You got you went in there in seventy four.

You went to Squad five, right, correct, And it was the mixture of guys transferred in.

Uh.

Some guys were left over from from forty one dash too and h and and some guys from forty one stayed there and then in the squad there.

So but so it was in forty one quarters.

Squad five forty one quarters. Characters came in, Uh that came in from other companies and all that, and uh it seems like, uh, some guys got there for punishment, you know when I did hear that.

They would send guys to the squad for punishments.

Yeah, that's what the story was. And there are a couple of characters there. And we had one lieutenant that got jammed up in Queen's there and uh they sent him up there. So he was he was very bitter and uh he's always cursing everybody out and all that. Great officer, he did his job and all that, but he was disgruntled. Well, yeah, that that's that's what he's for punishment.

Did you guys do regular you know six by nine and nine by six tours and we're.

Still in that six by nine and yeah, two day tours to night to us, so they still didn't get into twenty four.

And how were you operating?

Were you just going to you know a ten seventy five you would go to a job stretch a line.

With the point we go into forty one engine at six o'clock. At six thirty we'd leave. We'd go to eighty two engine. Eighty two engine would go to Queen's on the interchange, a interchange with two ninety five. So when two ninety five came up, we left and we went to ninety two engine and ninety two went in the back and we went ninety two for the up till midnight. That's what we did.

I remember night about midnight, right, so midnight we.

Were back to forty one and we only went to ten seventy fives. Yeah, and what was you.

Roll at the ten seventy five five needed?

As soon as they came in, we'd go. And they always had that expression take up squad. That was us. They We always took up right away as soon as the fire was under control, because we would go to another one very shortly. And all that, you know, and.

How would you operate there? Would you operate as an engine? Would you do it an engine?

It's an engine? Yeah? And the I remember Chief Griffin, he was up there. He's an old timer. He's always come over to us and take up squad, you know, and we go back and go to the next ten seventy five. We do that all night, you know.

So how many seventy five would you go to in a night.

We'd got you've got three or four maybe, uh, you know five, some you wouldn't work at, you know, but uh uh we went automatically to them.

You know, were you stretching your own line off of your rig or you stretch it off at the.

Times most sometimes, but other times you take whatever's closer to the fire. So we get out of there. You know, if you get tied up, you know, hooked up, you'll never get out of there. Or that right, then we do the opposite thing. We go to ninety two engine. They did interchange with a company, uh, I don't know where. They'd go up in North Manhattan, uh, North Bronx, and then we'd be ninety two. And then when the company interchange company came, we'd leave and when we'd go to

They go to the back You mean they would actually back there, ring on the back of the apparatus floor, and you guys were in front of them.

And I don't think a lot of guys understand it. That's what I was.

That's what I was getting from it, that you know.

Yeah, they were out of service, and like yeah, and then we'd be first up. Then we'd be the first wait till till midnight. Then we'd go to eighty five engine. They were in the tinhouse there on Boston Road, the same thing there, fifty nine trucks there and I don't even how we squeezed all the rigs in. But then then we have eighty five and then it was us and we'd be we'd taken eighty five roun until midnight.

And uh, and you guys would be jumping around all over the place.

You never knew, well, well, you're gonna have a meal.

I was just gonna tell you, how do you have the meal? You know, you never knew what you're eating.

Right eating and you don't know, you know, And that happened a lot. Sometimes we'd flag it and just get sandwiches somewhere or you'd go back there and wrap up the food and bring it, bring it to the uh you know, forty one's engines quarters there and then go to fifty Engine was the best because they had the old house. They had a three story extension where they built and you had uh uh volleyball they played in there. They played paddle ball, and they had a gold room

Yeah.

And when he and he finally disbanded it, uh there you go, finally disbanded, they said where do you guys want to go? Anywhere you want to go, And I went to fifty cut right to the short or not. But uh, deputies were there, the lieutenants there. At my tennis there were Tom Martin and you know tomt Bob Love, remember Bob Love he was.

I've heard their names, but they were a little before me. I got on seventy nine, so they were before me.

Yeah, they were. They were legends and all that, and uh, both of them and the deputies were there were the best. They were the real old times Nemechick, check Bill Burke. They were old timers.

And you have a lot of World War Two vets as uh as.

The old time guess those guys were, yeah, because I mean they were old timers to me when I go into the ice, you know, they were they were being old and they were great. They were just super. And so they said when you when you when you transferred, uh, where do you want to go? And everybody got their spot and then I went to fifty and all that just it was a great house, you know, still is. My son was the captain of that. He just my son just retired and he was the captain of Vengured fifty.

Really, oh that's great.

They gave that up. And yeah, and I worked in the truck any engine, Yeah what truck was in with them in nineteen nineteen truck.

Okay, that's a busy place, right.

Yeah, still busy and uh, very busy the engines up there. That's all that.

So so even though you got to play cards and volleyball, it was a lot of interrupted games, interrupted meals too.

Right meals. And I was in there. I just joined the band and I carried used to carry my pipes with me, and I always put them on the bed, the hose bed. And he said, with all the places we go to, and it's parked a block away from the fire, and you know, the shelf would leave it there and everybody go to the fire, and I somehow nobody had the kids used to climb the never.

H never touched it, never took it the.

The point and say, what what is that in there? You know? But then I stopped bringing them to the What year in the band form? The band started in nineteen sixty two. I started in seven, nineteen seventy five.

Did you play the pipes? Did you play the pipes before that? Or you learned to play?

Oh no, I was playing at seventy five. You had to learn on your own. And what happened and was when I was in the squad in between tours, a lot of times it's a good time to go out somewhere, you know. We used to go to sometimes the Long Beach because with the guy fireman on Kenny McGuire owned the chances used to hang out in Chances for the data and then come back in that night, which is.

I live right down the block from there.

Really, yeah, that is it was Kenny McGuire was a fireman, a nineteen truck.

Those are so many five in the Low Beach, always has been.

Man.

Yeah. But instead of I'd go out once in a while, I couldn't afford to do that anymore. I'd go I'd go to to take private lessons with the bagpipes for the guy from an old time from the Transit Arty, and I'd go to his house up in the North Bronx there and spend the day with him playing pipes and all that.

And then how long were you in the Badfoot you whole career from seventy fiftieth.

I'm the senior paper there anyway, and the senior drummer is I think you guys know Tom mctigue right, Yeah, got him on the show with his roll.

I heard not crazy man. I came on in a robe and I don't even know what kind of hattie had all he was nuts.

You never know with Tom, you never know. That reminds me here that he's a senior guy in the band.

Oh he throws that at you every once in a while. He's I said.

We'm a senior piper, a tough time marching anymore. But I still play with the guys in the you know, the funerals and all that.

You still go out huh wow.

Yeah, oh yeah, and uh that's a whole new story. I mean I get to two podcasts on that. Uh, on the band itself, all the places we've been, you know, just uh mago there's a picture of the band. Yeah and naturally nine to eleven. All the funerals we did, oh my god. Yeah, we did every every funeral, every plaque, dedication, memorial.

Service, street dedications.

They still do and it never end. And streets, like I said, street we just had one for Becky Becky Bobby beckw With just a month or two ago. But you know, after the funerals, you know, he said they didn't find anybody when they did find uh parts there and they'd have another.

Funeral the yep.

So it uh and they're still doing it. You know.

So you got any fires that stand out to you while you're in the squad that you can recall it.

Ah, there was a lot of a lot of fires that something we just learned recently there with my son Tim and all that. How I forget how these to operate. They forty one would so squad squad picked that up till they'd go to a fire and two guys would jump out, grab the line and go right in the building. You don't even know what happened. And the other guys, two guys were putting masks on, you know, getting and then helped them stretch him. But that's how they got it.

You know, they're gonna get the ship beat out of him.

And they did, and they did and and uh so we get a piece of a lot of fires there. The one fire that stands out which somebody just gave me the address, the date nineteen seventy seven, the Yankee Stadium fire. And the howard goes sell.

What he says, there's a fire. Oh yeah, I just showed my kids.

I was detailed a fifty five truck that night and we went when we went to the fire, there they were remounted a lot. Yeah, I remember this guy. I saw al Reese, he was from nineteen go through one of those big windows and into the building. As soon as he's in a couple of minutes and the whole floor lit up. Must get all kerosene or diesel oil or whatever. You could see the flames running across the floor.

That what what did that look like back in the seventies, It had to look like somebody had mentioned to me, it looked like like post World War two. That's what it looked like.

Is that is that the actual pictures there?

This I have it on mute.

It's sixteen minutes, it's on TV.

And this whole building is burning. And you know what, there are a lot of schools in the South Bronx that they just swalked away from. They locked the door and just left it and people got in there. It wasn't much to burning, man, because they were fireproof, but all the furnishings in there were taken run, you know, just the people just went in there and took everything that wasn't nailed down. It was amazing, right, And.

Look, just just to clarify for everybody listening, and you said, the first two guys would just grabbed the line and go, and then the three and four man with you know, the control and the door man. Back then you didn't have the four point five strapped you know behind you.

And they did too, and they had a lot of good like the firemen from forty one engine and forty one two and and uh, you know, it was a different world, right, I think tough guys. It's a lot of characters too, a lot of characters.

Yeah.

I remember when I got and they were just at that point the four point five said come in, and I think the nozzle in the backup had them, and if you had.

Three or four you still had to go for the suitcase.

Yeah, I was seventy nine, and then shortly after that everybody started having the four point You.

Were riding the backstep when you got on, right now, Yeah, yeah, both of you.

Yeah, well they at that point they didn't want you riding the backstep, but it was it was kind of like, we don't want you doing it, but we don't.

See you doing it. So got you know, at least in the ghetto as you were doing it. Then, you know, then a year or two and then that was you must have been doing that the whole time though, right.

Yeah, just about the whole time. I can still remember he had they had rigs uncovered. That was the You couldn't interchange it unless you had a covered rig. It was I don't know what they had on. I don't remember that.

But there was I think I remember seeing some old rigs with like a plywood canopy.

Yeah, the flywood box over over the seats. You know.

Times, and we had so many guys there. You get detailed, you one of your second first tour or second tour and all that. And I used to get detailed to seventy three engine. Uh like, so I tell you when and they did the hinter change. They wouldn't I wouldn't go on in the change. They leave me back. And when they two sixty three came in, now I was the c and I showing them where all the boxes are because a lot of guys didn't know that.

You know, oh that's what you wrote here the CEE and I doing right.

Let's be an tonight and uh it's stayed behind the show for there in the compartment and just tell them where to go and all that.

You were a human rat card.

Yeah. The guys I worked with in the story, you know. Yeah, but the offices were really uh good stories. Yeah, so we uh they changed the format with the squad so many times. A lot of times we just went to forty one engine and just went in in the front for them and uh and you know they listened to job somewhere and everybody went and off. But they saw it a something else which I remember the like I say, it happened to be a company forty four engine in

Mike Milner says, hello, ed, it's electric head. Mike.

Mike was a nineteen truck guy with Mike Jericho Fire Department. Maury, yep, is that the one with the green fenders?

Maybe, yes, it's green fenders on it the bumpers and yeah.

That that was that. We got this brand new rig in the quarters.

Look at the buildings behind it, all burnt out.

And the Captain Tony Alva, he was a legend up there. He took the rig to a shop and they had the the bumpers painted green. It's a great idea because a lot of guys are Irish and the company and uh, you know they were they thought it was the greatest idea, he said. And we walked to the rock for training and all that, and Dudley Class sees it. He's the chief of training and he just said, like what is that?

And you got a picture of it. Who got the picture?

Joe Pinto probably did it. You know. Joe Pinto, he was in a couple of he's a buff and he takes all the photos of all the rigs and all that, so he that's his picture there's I'm sure it's his pride and joy. I think.

When you were in the squad, did they ride with the same designations as they do in the engine? You had a chauffeur, you had an alvel man back up.

Yeah, it was yeah, it was the same same thing.

It was just and did they did they ever put you to work as a truck going now?

Uh? I think once? Uh one of the guys, Uh, the chiefs there just told us to go in there and get a couple of tools. We carry tools, but not very often there, you know.

So it's most of the engine stuff, just engine.

But we did a lot lot of a lot of running, a lot of running around and it was fun. I mean, we had a really really good time. And the officers. Remember our captain was Irving Schneider. He's a Jewish captain and he was from Staten Island. And he said, how did he have to get to the squad? What did

Yeah, do you think you caught you you saw your most fire in the squad or somewhere else.

Probably when in on the interchange with seventy three engine going back there some nights. We just we had a couple of young guys there. We would never tap out, but everybody else the officers tap out all the time to get the tour off or they get two hours off or something like that. And we didn't because we were now there and all that right, and uh so, but uh, I think the truck to twenty six truck seen he is there in the middle of all the projects. Yeah, a lot of projects.

And a lot of big names went. We'll get to that they did. You're right on that, yeah, yep. So let's talk about we talked about the seeing idol. Let's talk about when he got laid off, and we talked about that a little bit in the pre show. How they so gracefully informed you that you get.

Exactly. It's remember us sitting on a window sill there and it was like I think it was July fourth. Yeah, there's this rubble everywhere. It just there's that Charlotte Street. They always showed that picture, like you find the presidents came in or any big shots.

And where were you working at the time.

Little in the squad in the squad, okay, squad and uh we see the battalion coming, uh pop in there and driving over the rubble and all and he and he gets out laughing with the clipboard and he's waving it and he says, okay, guys, I got the list because the rumor was was out there with what was going on in the city. You know, everybody was getting cut and uh then he started reading off the names. You know you Murphy a Hern and Garretty, you knew you.

That's what you do.

Well, there was nobody left in the job. You know a lot of guys that laid off.

How much time did you have, Well, you got on in sixty eight. This was seventy what seventy seventy five, so you had some time on they went by, right, Yeah, a lot of guys went to drive buses. I think they said, right.

They got jobs with the transit at right, and so they were.

Let off for a week. Did were you married at the time.

You have kids, so yeah, you get I was married, and uh, you know people were calling me up offered me jobs, you know, relatives, and they said I get you work here structured or something like that. Right, and then eventually calmed down, you know after that that was it. Yeah, everybody. My brother in law is the school teacher. He got laid off. Uh, just you know a lot of people got laid off work for us. Then they had to reevaluate themselves and get them back on.

There didn't didn't a lot of firehouses like you just like when you collect house tax or each guy was throwing a few extra books.

I was going to say that, yeah, we did that.

I remember the guys giving the guys money, and it lasted for a while and then and then it just stopped, you know, because I don't know why people were coming and going and uh transferring out and then and and.

So what did they do? They called you up and they said you are like a week lady. You hired back again?

Yeah, I think I think, yeah, I think they did call up in fact there you know, uh.

You wanted to go, how did they Where did you go after that?

I went back right back to the where I started, you know, the company, same company school.

There's a lot of a lot of guys went somewhere else, right right, But you were able to go back to the squad.

Yeah, yeah, went back there. And he said we had some characters there too there from uh you know, everybody had a story behind them, and so it was an interesting place. And then when he finally had that's the room was. It's going to close like a two or three days. So it was working that day. A couple of guys from the shops come in, come in and the we're taking the bell. Yeah, the the bell you talk. You probably had that a big crawling thing on the bumper.

I got it sitting right here seventeen engines when they just.

Off the rig and they took it, took it to the shops and all that. And he says, because he knew somebody was gonna steal it, so there they wanted.

Yeah.

Then the next night they took the whole rig. So we were still free for that night and the next day. And the officers do what you want to do, you know.

Work, what do they do? They send you somewhere else, So they.

Just that was close. I went to uh we had papers in and I went to fifty. I put in for fifty and there was no contest. I mean between ninety two and in eighty two and eighty five and fifty and nineteen, it was just the best house. The deputies were the best. The officers were Tom Martin and they were real legends. And at a fire, you know, they really knew what they were doing. Tom Martins still around.

But uh, so you said you transferred there in seventy six, the old quarters on one sixty sixth Street.

We moved to the old Quarters in the seventy seven Maya. I think it was maya, seventy seven, and that's anohing. We were moving around the corner only, but we were moving with the rigs. We were moving everything until you know, we had lockers tied on the back step of the truck like, and we tied a bunch of stuff on the back of the engine. And after a while, you know, the captain, now we had a captain Sullivan to we

The areas of Brooklyn I've gentrified, like.

Yes, it's crazy, yeah, it's uh dead and and it went fast. But the Bronx still you can ride around now and still the change, but not like it everybody else did.

Right, Hey, look you mentioned the layoffs.

Yeah, you got rehired in a week because you had some seniority, but they were guys that were laid off.

What two three years?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, a couple of years.

I didn't know. It's that long thing, really, two three years, that's what I remember.

What I in one thirty two there was a fellow by the name of Jimmy Polite who was the last guy to get rehired.

And I think that was like seventy seven or seventy eight when he got rehired.

Really yeah, yeah, what is thirty two? Is that the eye of the storm?

Yeah, to eighty and one thirty two.

Mt.

Mcmahony, Yeah, Mike mcmannimon was in the engine.

He's in twenty six truck there, I think so, yeah, I think he went there something.

I don't know.

I don't know if it's the same, if it's Mike mcminnimon, Is that who we're talking about?

Okay, Okay, they to break his shoes big time, man, that it is.

The same, it's the same one. What does this mean? Like? What is that? Nothing? Okay, well let that one go, all right. So you're talking about and here too, you got loading up the box with Matt Daily. It's a new book that's coming out in the spring.

You have enough people signed up for to uh, so they're gonna print it. You know, you're gonna publish it. They just don't publish books unless they get a h you know, enough people said they're gonna buy it?

Right? Who was who was about? Tell us a little about Matt Matt Daily because uh, the chief he's a connect guy.

He's a connect guy, and he's a buff uh and he uh he was on the band photographer, you know, he and uh with us forever there and he had a stroke then probably about ten years ago. So he's he's a little tough to get around and all that, but he still takes his pictures and all that, and he buffs more or less. I had to rescue three. Right, we kid around all his pictures really from the from the from the Bronx and not from the Hall Water, from hall Im, not the Bronx and all that, but

He's got a book coming out in the spring. We're gonna have to get it up there where you can find it because Lieutenant Chief Done was talking about it too, so.

That's good if he's talking about it.

H m.

M.

What's the title of the book. It's cold Loading up the Box by matt Daily.

Yeah, Loading up the Box, that's the that's a uh, it's dispatches talk, you know, mean h on the radio when I want to fill out the box, I guess is it just.

Going to be pictures or is he going to have interviews of different firefighters?

It's good question. Good question. I'm not sure, but.

Okay, well, we'll talk more about it when when it's ready to come out.

Years ago, there was a buff in Brooklyn, Alex Dunchon, and he did the same thing. He published the book years ago. I haven't but it's old and it was called First Do and it's the same thing. It's he just buffed all the jobs in the Brooklyn ghettos.

And Michael took a lot of good photos too.

Captions you know who's working, but there's no interviews. But it's just all these pictures of flyers along the way. Yeah, well, Smike, who'd you said?

Michael Dick also has some archive of great photos that are all over you see him a lot.

Damn Powder posts a lot of them on Facebook.

You have any pictures before we move into a lot of one twenty six bike? Do you want to get to that we haven't gotten.

Too well, yep, let's do that right now before we get the truck. Twenty six is a show for school nineteen seventy five.

Oh yeah, that's I didn't know that. Had you even add that? I think Kevin o'hag you know Kevin o'hegg and Checky call him.

No, he.

He found his photo there somewhere. That's me in the middle in the front case.

You can't see Wow, squad five helmets. Yeah, wow, you got the stashed out.

Yes, I can't believe that.

I just wanted a picture here.

Before we use.

November fifth, nineteen seventy five. I guarantee you the out of the two three hundred guys in there, most of them were even born at that time. Oh, Timmy clutching there where Timmy clutching the chat so is Chief Noel.

Yep, that's that's I think I mentioned. They didn't mention that before. That's me tuning up on the pipe major at the time, tuning up Tommy Lockran's pipes there.

I thought you was giving a little flick on the ear there or something. I don't know what you were doing.

Turning them up. Tommy was I got. I was in his study group and he I taught him piping. He was in the piping class at all. And he was on his way to work one day and uh, coming down at the Conic where he had like a mini tornado or something. He took the top of a tree off and hit his car and he was killed. Wow. And that happened to be father Judge fighting Father Michael Judge's first job as a baby. Tom lived in Mayor pak that's crazy. Another his Jack McLachlan. Again, Uh, I

Well all the way upstate. Oh you bronx goat, that makes sense.

Yeah, but one of there. We looked everywhere and the house we had was too small in the storia, so we gave it a shot and uh spent nine years there in Carmel.

Beauty. Isn't that like right next to Mayo Pak.

Yeah, it's right next to my back there, it's a little above it. And we stayed there. We stayed there nine years, and we decided to come back because it was still rural and we came here, which was the flow part, which was the best move we haven't made. And uh, but the place was great up there. It was people didn't want to come up there anymore because it's always snowing, and they went to there, and but

So right, Gard lived there from Hazmat.

Yeah, yeah, he lived somewhere over there. Yeah, I remember him. I went to Hazmat School when it first they had it was on the department ordered anybody wants to go to a Hazmat school. So Jack Corchoran, myself, a whole bunch of guys went two weeks maybe three, and then we were so called technicians has Tex. Yeah, yeah, none do anything about it. But when I got promoted, I went to, uh, the fourteenth division. I was in an our group with Hazmat that was the stately you know,

Fire Bug was too strong in you. You couldn't know.

It just wasn't fun, remember mcgardal and all that. Then I when I was at Sock, I went to school to the Hazmad school again and that was tough. That was that was the real deal. It was like a college chemistry course stuffed into two weeks O and uh yeah, I remember going there because just in sock.

Any any companies, normal companies in the fourteenth that you kind of liked that you might have settled into if you didn't go back.

Yeah, I one thirty eight truck. I wound up in the one thirty eight. I heard so much about it and that the Corona Tigers. Finally it's only got my ut. I got a signed there. I worked there and then the spot opened up, so I was hanging out in there till they filled it. But Jimmy's explained was in two eighty nine.

Did you know him?

He was Balloons they call him.

Yeh, he was.

He was quite a character there. But you know he was in the enginet right.

Who was in the truck, Mike Pryor, He was in the truck.

Prior Mike Pryor. That's a kids are all on the job.

Uh yeah, yeah, and uh.

They staying there. Then the spot opened and John Carrol was the captain, asked me if for I want to stay there, and he says, giving the band, he say, uh, Chief of Rourke is a good friend of his. He's just and no I'm asking you that, but he said, you get it. I said, I said, I really appreciate it. But uh, the guy I only got forty forty points when this one he was going by points and all that. He says. The guy who wanted it Edie Herding. He was a Brooklyn guy.

He had like a truck.

Yeah, it hurting a nice guy, perfect And he wound up getting the spot because he had the time and everything else and all that. And I thanked John caw for, you know, putting me in, but I said, no, no, I don't want to do that. You know, that's worse. You know, get somewhere, but you don't have the time or anything. So that was the story with that. So after that he got the spot, I bounced around some more and then I went to twenty six truck. Jack

So where was he was a lieutenant there at the time? Corkoran.

He was a lieutenant Yes, Jack Corkoran.

And how did you know him before that? From from from.

Nineteen truck from fifteen nineteen he was in nineteen I was in the engine and we were just friends together. And he he lived up in Warwick. He was some Queens. He moved to Walwicks stay there for seven or eight years, and then he wound up coming back to Elmhurst. He lived right around the corner from the from my Rescue four right.

He was captain of Rescue FO. Yeah, And I told you I met him because I had I have a side business of ATMs and it happened to have one in the bar that he was in, like you said, had his own personal seat there. And every time I go in there, he was such a gentleman. Sit down, talk to me. Let's talk about the fire department. Let's talk this. How do you like the squad? Just a nice, overall genuine man like you couldn't get a better guy.

To him, you know, you couldn't get a better guy. And then became good friends, play golf together. And he's the one who's when I put in for Rescue four. He was going to bad for me, you know, and he got mad at me. He's say, anybody get mad? He says, I did all I could And you didn't, you know, because you knew von Essen and uh and and go to the mayor. You have to to commit the commissioner. Actually Vonasen's commissioners. You should have saw him

I didn't know you even worked. You don't have you worked the rescue four for six months, no sock and six months, but you put in for the spot and rescue four.

Yeah. It was always the big deal on because this is before the squads, right, So it was very very tight organization, right. You know, people didn't leave, you know, guys who had the spots and all that, right, So I stayed and then bounced around. It didn't bother me bouncing around. You know. They grew up in the city and knew where everything was.

And did you enjoy being in sock? Was it a different Yeah?

Yeah.

The person who worked.

Except except for two rescued too. You know, they get they had They're a different act. They're different, you know. And when I went in there, everybody knew who I was. I was the guy who didn't get the spot. Everybody is in the kitchen, yeah, and go hey, lo, what you working to night?

Yeah?

Where you're from? I'd say, uh, twenty six Struck and he says, oh, that's in Green Point, right, And well before that, I said, well, in the n fifty and nineteen and they were in uh you know, uh somewhere Long Island City, I am something or something like that. And you know, they were just they were just pulling my chain and I says, where we that before that? Five immediately got everybody's attention because they didn't know where

I think that got their attention, right, it did.

I enjoyed it. And Jimmy Jaggett was there, you know, Jimmy Jaggett. Yeah, he was a twenty six struck guy. So and the cracker Jack fireman. The guys when I used to go to work, my riding list were full of guys like that.

And uh so you don't get joy, don't go to work, you don't get the spot in four. So you go up the twenty six truck.

Yes, it's about it. They went up in the twenty six and they stayed there for fourteen years.

But you had to, you were telling me in the pre show you had to go talk to a bunch of guys, right, you had to because it was the h It was the spot that was the UFO.

Anny Bolan spot, right. Anny Bowlin was the off UFO way president and so it was his spot. So I had to see him. It was see him to get his blessing.

You know.

That's that's what he did at the union.

Mean Dominus of you got the spot all right?

Yeah?

Factory right?

Yeah? I think who else was some of the fire factory that have been he done? He worked there? Wait, I think in the enginet, the engine I think he.

Was the chief of Hazmat Fanning he worked up there, right.

Jack Fanning, Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's the guy. Yeah, good guy.

Me and Louis tell this story all the time when we first came to the squad, like and we ran into you know, Chief Fanning or anybody else that has that. For that sake, you automatically put this this label on them like they've never been anywhere, right because they're in Hazmat. And you come to find out that Chief Fanny was like a twenty six truck. Then you see him at something and he's got a chest full of medals here like, wow,

It was this guy, you know, he was in fifty nine truck in the engine eighty five and at this day that's it's one of those concert huts they call, you know. It was uh, it's uh what do you call those buildings there bits the.

Tin house, the tin house, like the tin house in Brooklyn.

It was the same thing to the truck and the engine. And then we'd squeeze in there and where was their roomauy, I know, in the back of the pool table and uh, we used to go there the terrible meals. The meals are like thirty five cents and you got the worth of food, you know, out of there. You know, we'd stayed at the.

Slugging beans potato chips or somethinghere.

And they had so much other places. It's eighty two was the same way they were. Uh. These they were all Dennis Smith was there at the time, I think, uh. And they had more people were buffs from everywhere going to eighty two engineer, you know.

Probably especially after he came out the book, right, I mean crazy, yeah, it's.

But the place was it wasn't like fifty nineteen anyway, and at the time, so.

You're going on record is saying fifteen nineteen is the place.

And and my son when he came on the job, he he went to nineteen truck.

Ah, I won't know how that happened.

Yeah, everybody says that, how that happen?

Now, that happened. So he went to the truck and.

Then he got promoted and he became a lieutenant fifty eight engine and he captain bounced around and he wound up in fifty engine. Look at that and uh, and he just retired, just left.

Was the lieutenant in the fire Factory video? That's you?

That's uh.

Somebody says you were the lieutenant and the five factory video.

They want to know if you were, if.

You were his son?

Yeah, I was, Yeah, I was in the video, the video, the Firefactory video talking about the band. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I was interviewed.

There for that.

H That was a while back. That's a lot of work there, twenty years.

We're in twenty six.

Would you say, of course we were, we were. You know, you can't say you're the Biggs of the best and all that, but you could say, you know, you can offend somebody, but top ten, you know, like, h.

Were you there when for the Schomburg fire or did you get there after that?

I was there. I wasn't working that day, but yeah, I was there for that. Jack Corkran was the officer okay at Corkoran.

I was working and rescue one that day. I was fairly new and the rescue when I had that job.

Is that the one that was the.

Cockpac fire originally Hank or Yeah, yeah, twenty six was first new truck.

Yeah, they're right down the block and he was at the door, the door of the apartment and it was cherry red as they're going down the hallway.

Because the compact the shoots were right next to the entrance doors, so they people were jumping that, you know, they were jumping from a couple from one of the floors. I think there was like seven fatalis on three different floors there.

Wow.

Yeah, that was well, the one of the pitchers before the two senior guys, Ed Roberts and Tom go back.

To that on Mike. I think this was ninety Right here, there's just the two guys.

They're in civilian close they Tom was the McCarthy. He was the chauffeur and standing next to the rig, the bodies were coming right next to him. Wow, kids, right.

It was that's when there was still the two five battalion then, because I remember the aid on the they we had been turned around and we were heading back, and all of a sudden, the two five battalions.

Transmit the second along. We got people jumping, and we turned around and started heading back.

And yeah, and I remember fire was showing out the windows on three different floors, like the thirty third, thirty second, and then and then there was heavy smoke coming out of like the twenty seventh floor.

It was.

It was a lot of fire in that old building.

They had shut They were doing work on the sprinklets system, so of course they shut it off and it was never turned back on.

For the weekend. And then the fire was in the compact to shoot and.

That building was built with federal funds so it didn't have to meet the city ordinate the fire codes.

And everybody, everybody was cut over. They couldn't get out.

Of their apartments because the compacted shoot doors were right next to the entrance doors, so the fire was coming out and it was taking that whole wall. So The only place people would go was they either jumped or they would hunt it down in the corner.

Back bedroom. Man, and they're going to do you jump? Jack said he thought he was going to die. Really the fire, I remember we hooked it up. We we ended up having a walk because the elevators went out of service. They were like Central correlevators. Water was coming down the shaft. So by the time we got there at elevators were with no goal. So we ended up booking it up.

Yeah. Yeah, it was bad, bad fire. That's bad. Yeah.

And so I just wondering, I don't know if you had that fire, but you said corkran had it?

Huh Jack corkran down? Yeah the fire? Oh yeah, good just realized that where where you guys met together, Jack and the Grandstand Grant. Yeah, yeah, the guy just died recently.

John Brown. Yeah, I know that. Yeah. He was a nice guy. Man.

A couple of couple of times. You know you mentioned that name.

Yeah, yeah, that Jack was just that was his home there and yeah, and what time you went in there, he was sitting in there, always open for a conversation too.

Man, good good friend. I was one of his poll bearers and Yeah, that was good guy. We're gonna do it. So we worked together quite a bit.

So you had obviously you had a ton of fire in your career, but when your time as a lieutenant in twenty six, you have one or two fires that particularly stick out, that were tough for something out of the ordinary happening.

There was a picture before you might have saw my head at the window there.

Yeah.

I think my son Timmy got that picture of that one there.

Okay.

And one thing I still ask my son with my hood I listen's before Hoods. I don't know when the Hoods came in before Hoods, because that's not I would have had it that. I'm on the second floor of the building. Here we look up. That's where thought the

Just the being courts right, yeah, And then it just lit up.

Everything lit up, so everybody was looking in the street up at the fire. Meanwhile, the fire was in the cellar. It was a Chinese restaurant and they left the cooking oil on and oil and uh. And on the first floor there was a Chinese restaurant, but they didn't go down the.

Cellar and had the fire week in the floor.

Or was it that the fact that there was a vacant apartment above that it was just rotted would just one of those things?

Yeah, it was.

It was.

It was a vacant apartment. It was you know, rip the part and all that, even though they was still operating the Chinese restaurant down there. But that, uh, there was a lot a lot of fire there, and I don't know how I get out if I went down the ladder or I went out to the entrance door there.

To wind up going to the burn.

That uh yeah, the uh time, we actually just at the hospital, went back to the where I got a doctor there who was like the uh, gave me a lecture on the e is how important it is, how sensitive they are if they get burnt or anything any you know, you can get disease in this and that and all that. So he hit me down this way and that way, and then I went to the back to the firehouse that way, and oh what uproar that course they thought I was dead. You know that way.

It wasn't your time. Excuse me, it wasn't your time.

No no, no, no, no no.

And this.

We went to. We went to a lot uh fires, especially because I had and the guys I had with me, the same four guys you see in the in the uh there's other pictures there. They were the same four guys they used to work with all the time. Mike Fitzgerald, you don't rest he went to four.

That's a different Mike Fitzgerald.

Man, that's Paul Baldwin on the left. With that's Baldwin. There came the squat and Mike said, Gerald, me, and then Tom on he's the guy was telling you about. And these are the two senior guys. On the left is Tom McCarthy. He's the one who said he's operating the pumper and the bodies are crashing around him from Schomberg Wow, and Eddie Roberts there he's he's doing okay, but Tom's Tom's not doing too good. He's got dementia and whatever that sucks, not doing right.

So had Baally Baldwin in your groups?

Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, his.

Dad was the at one time before me. It was the captain of Rescue one. And then he ended up in Rescue one.

Oh yeah, okay, I knew somebody I thought, yeah, yeah, he wound up. They never came back though, you know, I don't know what happened to him.

He could, they ended, We came't the squad to it. I haven't seen him.

Yeah he's still you know what, Hank, You'll still hit me up once in a while on a text out of nowhere. Yeah, it's so strange. He's a strange bird. I love him. He's a strange bird.

I worked in two eighty eight, two when it was before the squad.

I'm sorry you got to go to sleep, ye sure, it was, yeah, to.

To eighty nine. I had a couple of fires there. Yeah, that was a busy, busy place, and.

One thirty eight had a huge response area man huge, Like if you're not from like if you're from Brooklyn or somewhere and you go to one thirty eight, like where the hell were we going home or something? But it's huge. The response area all the way from Flushing to Corona, sometimes the Loyal City, sometimes the Masmith Hike. It's just the response area is huge.

He told me that when you when you go heading to Flushing, they shouldn't say that the stories, but they said, just when you go out there, you're signed second. Do you're going to be first?

Yeah?

I don't know. They're trying to trying to tell me something that I know. And then but quite a few few fires. In fact, we had a fire, made a couple of grabs and we wrote one guy up there, let me tell you his name, and he got a B out of it, maybe something A or a B. And I got a letter from I get, uh, are taking into mission your second?

Absolutely? What about you? You gotta take one intermission?

I think he's looking for the letter. Yeah, we don't pull me into an intermission because you're thinking about it.

I might be in a cup, bro, guys don't know already.

Now you gotta halftime report has brought to you.

By Louis Ricardo. Oh my girl, Cindy Drake is in the chat. Love Cindy, Love me some Cindy always watching the Cup of Joe. Listen to you, guys? Could you start sending some more stuff in? Bro run a little dry? I don't know how to keep asking you to sending pictures. I guess you guys have no company pride. You don't want to send them pictures of your rigs or your kitchen table or as far as you've been to send them in. Will you? What do I gotta do by show over the head every.

Time in the chat. Joe Schneiderman, Joe snder.

Is always in there. Timmy Cluk Clutt, Oh Johnny? Uh fipello? What's I love that? Ask Clut because I'm not I don't see the chat. Ask if he's going to be in Orlando in February, Clutt, you've gotta be in Orlando in February.

Hank Watson out, Garretty has returned, Tenant, I.

Am returned, but I have a problem. Yeah, Uh she fell last night? Oh no, yeah? And uh.

Shet off Yeah, okay we could sign off, no problem whatsoever? You gotta you gotta do what you gotta do, my.

Friend, do what I gotta do.

Okay, we'll do a part two.

Yeah, we'll do a part too. Don't worry about it, don't do what you gotta do. We'll close out the show. Okay, take care, take care, good love. Look, it was no worries. Do what you gotta do. We understand, appreciate it. Got no problem. We'll have to h We'll get him back on, good guy.

Back on, for sure. He has some more stories to tell.

Yeah, all right, so Hank, how you making out of it. We love the fact that you have no problem with your internet anymore. I didn't want to say anything.

Now that you said that. Now that you said that.

One point when you had a picture of twenty six checks, Rick, it was getting a little crackling and stuff, and I was like, here we go.

Even great. He Hanks to his new digs, his new palatial estates.

Out there and wherever he is letters dance, and he said he's got his niece's wedding.

So all right, sorry, we'll see this yet, Tim, Tim, Tim, I know I've been telling you this so like a million times. We got to do that training on engine ops that'd be good.

I was gonna say really quick, just before it slips my mind. It's amazing you guys didn't work together, meeting you and the lieutenant. But it's amazing how many people you knowed it overlaps. Yeah, you guys ran in the same service.

Yeah, yep, I'll tell you.

Remember he mentioned that fellow Ed Herding, Yes, right, and I said, oh, Ed Herding went fourteen.

Yes, I tell you, I mean Ed was a senior guy.

Because the way I met ed Herding was I was a youngster working for Pan American Airways and I had taken the test to be a city fireman.

I was waiting to get called, but I was still at pan AMS.

This was like nineteen seventy eight.

And one day they told me we need you to drive these papers or something. It was somewhere in Brooklyn, so I, you know, they gave me directions. It was you know, there was no phones with GPS's right, it was like a written direction. So I'm you know, I take my car and on the way there, I noticed I passed the firehouse. It was like it was one fourteen, and I forget the engine. If it wasn't, I think it was a single.

House, single house and then now there was two on one I believe. So on the way back after I dropped out, I says, you know what I'm going to go.

So I stopped my car and I knock on the door and I'm and uh, Ed Herding answers the door.

He was on housewatch, really, so I said to him, Hey, how you doing.

You know, I'm I'm waiting to get hired on the job, and uh, you know, I just had to be passing the firehouse. I'm working at pan am right now, but I got a few minutes to kill. So he'sa come on into the firehouse.

So he you know, he brought me in.

We went to the back, had a couple of coffee guys were there. They were real nice, you know, we were just talking.

And everything, and.

You know, and I always remembered, you know, Ed Herding was the guy that let that led me into the flyhouse.

It was a real nice guy on the job. You know that is left a lock of circle. Yeah right, yeah, somebody's asking, oh, I think Frank yourself is about the Yes, Louis and I will be at the Long Island Show. That is the thirty first, first and second thirty, first of January, first and second of February. Come into the booth, hang out with us. Frankie knows. You know, Frank We have a couple of you know what I mean, a couple of o's. We tell fire stories a lot of

Oh?

There it is? Check it out well on Expo January thirty, first February second, Nasal Coliseum. Come out and see us there we go there. Before we go, we have to play the FRC commercial.

We certainly do.

We do.

Let me cue it up our friends from fr CE.

The First Responder Center for Excellence. This is a not for profit organization dedicated to protecting their lives and livelihoods of first responders. Their education and research initiatives aim to bring greater awareness and understanding the challenges to the health, safety, and well being of firefighters, EMS personnel, and other first responders too. They are an affiliate of the National Fallen Firefighter Foundation.

All right, so my old school health and safety tip and then is something that Hank and I were talking about in the pre show. If you got a problem, get it fixed, right, Hank, I mean, this is what we're talking about. I'm getting my knee replaced, but I should have got that done five, six, seven, eight years ago, because then it leads to other problems. Now my hips bothering my mother, other knee is bothering me. So safe thing goes for anything. High blood pressure leads to a

We do talk about the psychological end, and we talk about the heart and all that, but when you do a job like a firefighter, and you do it for twenty twenty five years, you also have lots of orthopedic problems.

You don't tend to talk about that as much.

You know, on the air, we talk about it when we get together. But you get beat up, you know, you're wearing a mask on your back. I don't hardly any fireman that don't have some type of compressed vertebrates haven't had an injury where they need the shoulder operated on and knee operating on, and and then you're good when you're young because you're rebound. Then when when you're retired and like you say, we're talking about now, you know, and you're looking for quality of life. You work your

Now.

Yeah, you know, I'm doing stuff now since I had my knee replace that I didn't do for you know, ten years, so, like I said, should have got it done sooner.

Yeah, Mike's looking at what are you talking about? Like he's twenty something years old. He's not even paying attention.

My cement heads.

You know I can do this.

I can do it. You can. But it's also you know, a better way. Here's another thing to listen to your wife. Because my wife's been telling me for eight years, why don't he replace, Why don't get me replaced by replaced? I'm like, ah, so finally now that my legs are going this way, I have to get it replaced me. That's it's all I got Mike listen. I hope my Hank. Thanks for coming in short notice. I appreciate the wop swap tonight. Man, it's awesome, my pleasure. Uh, everybody praying

Is the anniversary of the Father's Day fire coming up?

Sooner?

Am I wrong?

June?

Father's Day?

June, not Father's Day?

The Black Black Sunday?

Yes?

Next week?

Yeah, next week? I know it was coming up third, Okay, we also coming up. I just booked a guy who does documentaries. He's an award winning documentary Uh, he's do He put together documentary on volunteer firefighters. It's gonna be awesome. We're gonna have him on. We're gonna show the trailer and we're gonna have a viewing. It's gonna be up here in New York somewhere, but we're gonna rent out a theater and do a viewing. It'll be a great thing.

If you're listening, if you're out there, can you get my boy, Kevin and Louis into the shops place.

I want to do it.

And there's a lot of people that other departments that are interested.

In our shops.

When they the size of it and what gets done there.

You would think the guy sat next to him and rescue school. But now he's a big week. Now he's chief of the apartment. I can't talk. Let's let's get them into the shops.

I think that show won't be as big as the rock, but it'll be up there.

It'll be up to everybody. I love you, I love the rake. Bro. Come on, all right, I'm right now. Soon as we hang up. All right, all let's say yo, chief Fastball, let's go, come on you, Johnny, Johnny, let's go. All right. That's all I got. You got anything else?

Oh?

We have a shout out, ton I Mike.

Shot a few shoutouts after this. But first let me share the screen here so we can highlight this one stand by. Take it away, coops.

Oh you have to read it, Mike. I can't read what my fucking glasses from here.

Okay, So this is Avon Volunteer Fire Department Deputy Chief Dave TERRYO.

I hope I'm pronouncing that right. If I'm not, I sincerely apologized.

Uh.

He unfortunately is currently battling cancer. Pardon me while I get that back to the tap, and this is his go fund me. We're gonna paste the link in the chat, uh, just so you could assist naturally. As you can imagine, during a process like this, the bills can pile up and it can get to be a lot. So I'll copy and paste that link in the chat so you can contribute to its go fund me. Of course, all the proceeds will go to his family pay for his cancer treatment. So please keep him and his family and

Thank you, Mike. Also, we got producer Pete making his comeback. He's coming on the show. He's gonna talk about everything he saw out in California. We'll talk about the fires a little bit, and our prayers go out to the brothers and the people who lost so much out there. And I know it's a big political mess. I've had problems on Facebook guys all over the place on this and all I asked you to them to be is just be respectful. But he got out of control. We

The first response is out there busting their ass.

Oh yeah, man, right, they don't need to be second guessing them. Now. We can leave the politics for later. This is not about a political agenda. It's about the brothers in the thehood nation, bro, And like you said, all the people that are affected all in the same country. So I think I heard today eleven thousand structures burnt to the ground. Eleven thousand. That's crazy, it's insane. Insane. Hank again, thank you, Look great man, Look at you with the ten he's at the head of head now

Uh?

I hope you get the call soon. I just talked to Procaccini and LOUI are going down there to film a show and Mike get sworn in. Uh yes, you're going out to dinner, even if Salty has to pay. As long as your mom's just next to me at the table, We're all good, broel.

Got alevehead Nation.

Be safe out there.

A couple of shout outs really quick before we go going's belated well these three shoutouts, so see guys a Saturday. Shout out to Jake Gannon and Eric Staalzer and Sarah Elkins from b Schiff look forward to see you guys a Saturday. And a belated shout out to my friend Kyle Lang. He's on where Procaccini is now. He just graduated last one for the Stanford Fire Academy, so.

Awesome, good stuff. Procaccini told me that you guys go to a lot of work over there.

He said, uh yeah, yeah, Stanford's busy and New Haven's busy too.

The way, Bro, Mike can't wait to see stor fire stories with him. Hank look at him. Can't wait till he buses Sherry, I hear you all right, guys, We'll see you next week. Remember setting your stuff in Coobs Podcast at gmail dot com. Send your stuff in for the Cup of Joe and Fueger if you want to keep it going until then, We'll see you next week.

Stay loan and go alright, Everyboddy, I'll be half of Hank Malay and Kevin Coobler and Mike Clone.

We'll see you next time. Fransmit the seventy three Working Fire Wow