Enthusiasm Still Burning : 69-Year-Old May Be State’s Oldest Active Firefighter but He Isn’t Ready to Quit

He may be one month shy of his 70th birthday, but veteran firefighter Donald E. Wright is nowhere near ready to hang up his turnout coat.

Wright is the oldest active firefighter in Orange County and possibly the oldest in California. He continues to do his job--rushing to emergencies, battling house and brush fires, giving first aid to the injured--alongside colleagues who in many cases are young enough to be his grandchildren.

“I think it’s all of the physical activity and working with all of these young people that keeps me young,” Wright said while on duty at Santa Ana’s Station 2. “I know I have to keep up with them if I’m going to work with them.”

During the recent Southland fires, Wright’s engine company helped battle firestorms in Orange and Los Angeles counties in a span of nine days.

After working through the night in Anaheim Hills, Wright and his company went to Laguna Beach where a firestorm was plunging through the canyon. After helping to fight that fire for more than 10 hours, Wright got some sleep and was back at work at the station at 6 a.m. the next day.

And, when another fire broke out in Malibu a few days later, Wright was there pumping water as firefighters worked to protect the seriously threatened Pepperdine University.

“Everyone is acting like I should be dead after all of that,” said Wright, who was responsible for driving the company’s engine to the fires, hooking up the hoses and pumping the water.

Wright has been on the job for 47 consecutive years, rarely missing a day of work. And because the Fire Department has no mandatory retirement age, he is eligible to remain an active firefighter as long as he can pass the annual physical and get good marks on the job. Wright said he doesn’t foresee failing either test.

“They’ll probably have to carry me out of here in a pine box,” he said.

His longevity has earned him the admiration of his colleagues.

During a break in fighting the Malibu blaze, a 5-year-old boy approached a group of about 50 firefighters from across the region and began collecting their autographs. Many in the group immediately directed the youngster to Wright.

“They told him he had to have my autograph because I was the oldest firefighter in California,” Wright recalled. “It made me feel good.”

Officials of the California State Firefighters’ Assn., a service organization representing 28,000 firefighters statewide, were hard pressed to think of any full-time firefighters who were even close to Wright’s age.

“Are you sure he’s not a volunteer?” asked an incredulous Robert B. Hamilton, assistant general manager of the association. “It sounds like he is the oldest professional firefighter around. I can’t think of anybody anywhere who is older and still working out in the field.”

Around Station 2, where he has worked for the last 13 years, Wright is known as Dewey, a nickname derived from his initials. And Dewey has taken it upon himself to nickname most of his colleagues, too.

“There’s a firefighter named John Jason and I call him Chuck because John just didn’t seem to fit him,” a relaxed Wright said as he sat on the back of the station’s fire truck. “Another guy, Michael Overn, I nicknamed Bruce. His wife would call the station and I’d say that we didn’t have a Mike. So, pretty soon, she was calling and asking for Bruce.”

Fire Capt. Andy Money, who has somehow escaped being nicknamed by his colleague, has kind words for Wright, whom he has known for 21 years.

“He’s been around this town for so long that he can go just about anywhere blindfolded,” Money said. “He knows his job well and his experience is an asset to us. And he’s a good guy too, good to be around.”

His colleagues and superiors said Wright has been a role model for other firefighters. But Wright has also been a model for his family.

His 51-year-old son Doug has worked as a firefighter for the Newport Beach Fire Department since 1964. His grandson Erin, 24, has been a member of the Fountain Valley Fire Department since 1991.

Wright said that when his grandson was sworn in as a firefighter, it was the “proudest moment of my firefighting career--having three generations working like this.”

But father and son not only have firefighting in common--they also are married to twin sisters. Doug and his wife, Pam, married 28 years ago. Donald, who was a widower, married Pam’s sister, Diane, five years later.

Wright said introductions can be confusing but “we all get along great.”

Diane Wright, 51, said she is in no rush to see her husband leave the department.

“If he retired, he would drive both of us nuts,” she joked. “He’s not ready to retire; he enjoys the job too much. He’s not ready to stay home all day and have me tell him what to do.”

There was a time when Wright almost had to retire. The department’s mandatory retirement age of 60 loomed in 1983; Wright’s future with the department was in doubt until then-chief Bill Reimer intervened on his behalf.

Reimer “told the city attorney to write the retirement system a letter saying that I was going to stay and that the city was going to continue to pay me,” Wright recalled. “The letter said that if they were going to sue us, to go right ahead. But they never did.”

The department’s mandatory retirement policy has since been rescinded, and Wright has the full support of current Fire Chief Allen (Bud) Carter, who is one of seven fire chiefs Wright has worked under since joining the department on Aug. 1, 1946.

“He is incredible,” Carter said. “Because of his seniority and experience, Don has been a touchstone for the past and the present. Even at his current age, he focuses on the future. He has set a standard for commitment and dedication that is beyond belief.”

Wright “continues to be graded above average on his annual evaluation, Carter said. “He’s doing just great. He participates, he stays fit and he’s active. He’s just an aggressive, motivated individual.”

When not out on a call, Wright said, his days on duty are filled with cleaning fire equipment, attending classes and doing drills. He works three 24-hour shifts on alternate days, then has four days off.

Wright calls Fire Station 2 his “home away from home.” He takes his turn cooking meals for the crew, specializing in fish and chowder.

“Everyone cooks,” he said. “Some better than others.”

The station, with its comfortable living room and television set, is a far cry from the first station Wright was assigned to almost five decades ago. That station, he said, “was like a barn.”

But little else has changed throughout the years.

“It’s just like it was in 1946,” he said. “You have a house fire, you hook up to a hydrant, and you put the fire out. But, I have to say, when I started out, never in my wildest dreams did I ever think they’d have air-conditioned fire trucks.”