All Local, All The Time

How does Niwot work? - Part 18

Mountain View Fire Rescue

Fire protection in Niwot goes back at least 100 years, as evidenced by the Firehouse Museum next to the Left Hand Grange in Niwot. An early cart used to put out fires with a chemical mixture rests outside the museum, a relic from early days of firefighting efforts.

Today, fire protection and rescue services are provided by Mountain View Fire and Rescue, a sprawling special district that was originally established in 1961 as the Longmont Rural Fire District to provide professional fire protection to Niwot, Brownsville, Mead and other unincorporated areas that had been developed, but were not covered by existing municipal fire departments.

The special district, with an elected board of directors, assessed a mil levy for property taxes to generate funds for the construction of a professionally manned firefighting facility on County Line Road east of Niwot. But it took until 1975 for the district to hire its first career fire chief.

For the better part of the 20th century, Niwot depended solely upon volunteers to respond to fires and other emergencies. The Niwot Men's Club, including Dick Hicks and Mike Holubec, helped organize the first modern volunteer fire department in Niwot. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pr3tyAG0c-4J2M_nsyavk_ofKgsfT721/view?usp=sharing

The Niwot Volunteer Fire Department was incorporated in 1977, with Holubec, Donald Herman and Tom Theobald serving as the initial board of directors. The need for quicker response times spurred organizers to build a fire station on property owned by the Left Hand Grange.

The Longmont Rural Fire District contributed two fire engines, one modern, and the other a relic from the 1940s known as Engine No. 10, to the newly built station. The volunteer department worked hand in hand with the fire district to provide firefighting and rescue services to the area.

Funding for equipment for the Niwot volunteer department was an issue, with support coming from local businesses, individuals, and an annual chili supper. The department became an integral part of the Niwot community, participating in Niwot Nostalgia Days with hose wars, mud volleyball and other events. The department also provided educational programs at Niwot Elementary School.

The chili supper, held annually in the fall at the Left Hand Grange or Niwot Elementary School, attracted over 1,000 patrons, who often bought tickets when the fire trucks drove through their neighborhoods, responding to firefighters going door to door with a polite knock, and a message of "You come to our chili supper, and we'll come to your fire."

A silent auction with items donated by area businesses raised additional funds. Folding chairs purchased by the Niwot Volunteer Fire Department for the chili supper are stored at the old fire station, and are used to this day for community events such as the Pancake Breakfast on the 4th of July.

When calls came in over the radio, the first responders were likely to be volunteers from the Niwot station, with the professional firefighters eventually arriving from several miles away, assuming they had not been deployed earlier to another location in the district. Many of Niwot's male volunteer firefighters worked at IBM, or in Boulder, or Longmont, and it was not unusual for women firefighters, often housewives, including Barb Froula, Pam Tennant, Barb Theobald, and Phyllis Sjoberg, to be the first on the scene of a daytime fire or accident. Other volunteers of that era included Hicks, Herman, Holubec, Theobald, Scott Tennant, Cliff Tharp, John Stobbelaar, Biff Warren, Greg Young, John Pakan, Charles Cullum, Karl Heil, Mary Kridel, Starr Aldrich and Doug Miller.

By 1983, the district had built a new modern fire station on Niwot Road, which serves as one of several manned district stations to this day. Eventually, Erie, Dacono, Superior, Eldorado Springs and other areas were added to the district, and the local volunteers were replaced by well-trained professional firefighters, with modern equipment and trucks. EMTs and ambulance services were also added.

Response times were considerably shortened for fire calls, accident calls, and medical emergencies. The Niwot Volunteer Fire Department as an organization separate from the Mountain View Fire Rescue District, was finally dissolved in 1996.

The Mountain View District, which in Niwot extends south to Lookout Road and north to the edge of Longmont, and west to Haystack Mountain, and east to Highway 287, often provides mutual aid to other nearby departments, such as Boulder Rural and Lefthand Fire District. For more information, visit http://www.mvfpd.org.

 

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