Word: firemen
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...poorest and most wretched neighborhoods in America is shattered by the blare of an electronic siren. The girls know the drill: they file neatly out of the red brick firehouse while Lewis and his crew snatch up their coats and helmets. In a flash, all five firemen are aboard their truck and rocketing out of the station to handle one of the 70 emergency calls they receive each week at one of the busiest station houses in Chicago. The 17 fire fighters of Engine Co. 16, nearly all of whom are black, specialize in more than fighting the high-rise...
Children account for nearly two-thirds of these projects' population, and many of them have fathers who are either missing, in prison or dead. The firemen, therefore, stand among a handful of male role models in this urban wasteland. On their days off, they drop by to tutor children in chess and math and to encourage them to stay in school. Most important, they offer discipline, tenderness and inspiration to a community where such things are in terribly short supply...
Until about 10 years ago, this tiny firehouse served as a training ground for rookies and a house of punishment for white firemen who had fallen out of favor with their bosses. Most of those men took little interest in the neighborhood--with the exception of the few black fire fighters who were there--and treated the station house as a fortress. Residents viewed them as outsiders, and some youngsters vandalized the place with rocks and graffiti. But as white firemen slowly transferred out, a core of African Americans who chose to remain behind began leaving the station's steel...
Initially pleased, the firemen soon realized the kids were skipping class to hang out in the firehouse. So Engine Company 16 approached Betty Greer, principal of the closest elementary school, with an unusual idea. "These men basically adopted us," Greer says. With profits from the pay phone attached to the firehouse, which had heavy use from local drug dealers, the firemen bought radios to give away each month to children who earned especially good grades. They persuaded police officers and junk dealers to begin dropping off broken bike frames. A local bicycle repairman donated old tires and rims...
...were awakened by the firemen," said Matthew A. Stratton '00. "They were clearing us out and they were really scared...