Nicholson looks back on 50 years as fire chief
Kelly Tunney | Herald-Standard
South Brownsville Fire Chief Woody Nicholson, in the mirror of one of SBVFD’s fire trucks, will be stepping down after 45 years as chief, but will continue to be involved in the department he’s been with for so many decades.
Kelly Tunney | Herald-Standard
South Brownsville Fire Chief Woody Nicholson will be stepping down after 45 years as chief, but will continue to be involved in the department he’s been with for so many decades.
In his early days with South Brownsville No. 1 Volunteer Fire Company, a fire chief told Edward “Woody” Nicholson that he’d be chief someday.
Nicholson remembered, “I told him, ‘I don’t want to be chief. I want to fight fires.”’
Nicholson ended up doing both: serving as fire chief for 45 years with the company he joined in 1964. Now he’s decided to step down as chief but will remain part of the company.
“It gets in your blood,” he said.
A native of Brownsville, Nicholson, 76, is one of six children born to William and Harriet Nicholson. Ten days after he graduated Brownsville High School in 1958, Nicholson’s father died and he went to work at Hillman Barge.
Nicholson entered the Army in 1960, spending two years in Italy as a senior supply sergeant in a missile outfit. He returned to Brownsville and went back to work at Hillman until the company shut down in 1995. He was employed at Brownsville General Hospital from 1996 until 2006 when the hospital closed its doors. He now works part-time for Brownsville as code enforcement officer and building inspector and is the borough’s emergency management director.
“He’s my number-one guy,” said Jim Lawver, borough council president. “He’s someone you can count on. He’s always there to pitch in. He’s an asset to the community.”
Nicholson, who has been married 48 years and has four children and six grandchildren, joined the fire company after being persuaded by fellow Hillman employees. As the company has a 30-person roster, he had to wait a year to be accepted.
In contrast, the company has about 28 members today with some openings unfilled.
“People have more demands. Wives work. And there’s the demands they put on you – you have to attend 180 hours of fire school before you can fight a fire. Everybody has to have criminal background checks,” Nicholson noted.
Training is a constant for firefighters. Besides what’s done in-house, Nicholson said training is provided through the Fayette County Fireman’s Association and the Southwestern Pennsylvania Chiefs and Assistant Chiefs Association. Nicholson is an assistant director and former director of the Southwest school and also a past president of both associations.
Nicholson remembered his first call: a small trash fire he put out under the guidance of more experienced firefighters.
He soon learned: “There’s no season for fires. It’s every day. When the fire whistle blows, you come. You never know what you’ll get involved with.”
That includes tragedies, such as a 1968 fire at the Pennsylvania Hotel in which three people died, including a woman who jumped out a three-story window.
“It’s hard when we have a death. It hurts the firemen, too,” Nicholson said. “You always think you can do more. We cry, too.”
The times when firemen bring people to safety are gratifying.
“Anytime you help people, it makes you feel good. We’d do anything for our community that we can,” Nicholson said.
These days, calls for help come more often.
“When I first came in, 40 alarms a year was a lot. Now we answer 350 to 300 alarms a year,” said Nicholson. “We do traffic control, answer automatic fire alarms, trash fires.”
One of the most trying times for the company was the 1985 Election Day Flood that hit Nov. 5.
“We had two feet of water in this fire hall. We didn’t go to sleep for three days,” said Nicholson. “We took stuff out of people’s cellars. We rode a boat on Water Street. In places where there were dips, the water was 10 feet.”
No matter the call, safety is always a concern.
“My goal is when you leave this station that you come back in the same shape,” Nicholson said. “I’m not going to send someone to a place where he might get hurt for nothing. To rescue somebody – yes – but not in a vacant building.”
One of the company’s most serious injuries took place at a January 1970 fire when Nicholson was assistant chief. The house’s chimney fell on Chief Edward Rohrer. Nicholson said Rohrer eventually lost his leg due to infection. Nicholson was elected chief later that year.
As chief, Nicholson is in charge of the fire company and represents it at meetings and events.
But he noted, “It’s not a one-man show” and praised all the volunteers, noting the work of president Chuck Clayton, as well as the auxiliary.
South Brownsville also has a junior fire company that started in the early 1980s with 15 members, including one of Nicholson’s sons. Today both his sons – Kent and Todd – are members of the regular company.
Nicholson said of the junior company, “A lot of the members have gone into the medical field – paramedics and EMTs. Today, we have around five – one just turned 18 and was voted into the regular company. We have two women who are regular company. They were in our junior company. Both are daughters of regular firemen.”
Besides protecting their community, the company spends a lot of time raising funds to do so.
“When I came in, you could equip a fireman for about $500. Now it’s $5,000 or better,” noted Nicholson, who also said the company is responsible for maintaining four trucks and two boats.
The borough contributes funds each year but to meet their needs, the company has several fundraisers, including a weekly bingo and the annual Kennywood Day, a fundraiser shared by several Brownsville companies that has been a tradition for more than 100 years.
“My whole lifetime I only missed three Kennywood Days when I was in the Army,” Nicholson said, noting one year he didn’t make it to the park until 9:30 p.m. after umpiring a Little League game – he was a Little League volunteer for many years.
Nicholson has a deep love for his community, which recognized him in 2008 with Woody Nicholson Day. Local organizations such as the American Legion and Jaycees have also honored him with awards through the years. He’s proud and happy to be living here.
Nicholson said, “I don’t think any place in the world can beat Brownsville.”