Woman enjoys ride on restored Huntington Beach fire engine, both 102 years old
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Lois Rufer was in the old Yankee Stadium when Major League Baseball Hall of Famer Lou Gehrig made his famous farewell speech in 1939, declaring himself “the luckiest man on the face of the earth.”
Rufer was just a teenager then. The Fountain Valley resident of more than six decades is now 102. She could consider herself lucky on Thursday.
Rufer got to take a ride in a refurbished 1922 Seagrave, the Huntington Beach Fire Department’s first motorized fire engine, at the Central Net Training Center.
Rufer, who shares her birth year with the rig, rang its bell and cranked the horn.
She said she remembered reading about the vehicle last year, when the department received a donation of old fire equipment.
“It is gorgeous,” she said of the truck. “I’ve never got this close to it [until now], and it is absolutely gorgeous. I appreciate every single minute that those men put in to restore it.”
She was delivered to the event by her son and daughter-in-law, meeting Huntington Beach Fire Chief Eric McCoy, City Councilmember Butch Twining and other officials in the process.
While fire engines today go for more than $1 million, the Seagrave engine was purchased for $14,500 in 1923, Huntington Beach Fire Captain Rex Rysewyk said. The Seagrave was in service until 1966, and then given to Travel Town Museum in Los Angeles.
In 2002, former Fire Chief Michael Dolder exchanged a forklift to get it back from the museum, and the Huntington Beach Firefighters’ Assn. soon began a 15-year restoration project, led by HBFD engineers Rysewyk and Andre Clarizio.
“For me, this is quite the experience,” said Rysewyk, who took the ride with Rufer. “They always say, they don’t build them like they used to, and that’s very indicative of the young gal that we just spoke to. Just seeing her elated and having these two historians experience that event is pretty satisfying for me, probably more so than the actual restoration process.”
Lewie Derigo, 95, the oldest living former Huntington Beach firefighter, also attended Thursday’s event. He was hired in 1958 and retired as fire captain in 1982.
Rufer was asked if she had any advice for living a long life.
“Yes, I absolutely do,” she said. “Keep breathing in and out. Once you stop breathing, it’s over.”
