Beaufort firefighting pioneer Stephen Brown lives his dream
Stephen Brown reached under the podium Friday and retrieved a worn red helmet and a badge.
He was perhaps a bit bleary-eyed, having worked the overnight shift as the supervisor of Richard V. Woods Memorial Bridge. But he had a story to tell at the grand opening of the new Beaufort-Port Royal fire station on Ribaut Road.
Brown has done exactly what he dreamed of as a boy growing up downtown behind what is now Best Western Sea Island Inn.
He wanted to fight fires like his father, Harold.
And he wanted to operate the Lady's Island bridge.
Brown became the city's first paid black firefighter in 1970 after volunteering for the city and the all-black Pioneer Fire Company.
"Back then we called it the colored fire department," Brown said of the station that employed a 1939 Dodge ladder truck stretching more than 30 feet.
Not long after he was hired by the city, Brown was tapped by city manager Don Fisher and Chief John Harriet to head the new fire station in Mossy Oaks.
He recalled the residents who paid a dollar a year for fire service. His first checks were $53.66 each week.
Brown pointed to a faded newspaper photo Friday, brown at the edges and protected by plastic, that shows him at the ribbon-cutting for the Mossy Oaks station.
"We stayed there because we wanted to be firefighters," Brown told the crowd Friday. "We're the ones that opened the door for you."
The move to an all-white neighborhood was an attempt to run him off, Brown thought at first. But the family behind the station brought him meals, and he befriended longtime Mossy Oaks resident Ed Rentz.
On his first shift at the new station, Brown responded to a fire on Allison Road. He fought fires 35 years, retiring in 2001.
After stepping aside, Brown checked in with the S.C. Department of Transportation contractor that oversees Beaufort County's swing bridges, reaching for his another goal. There was a position for an operator, and Brown began his second calling, opening and closing bridges high above the water.
Brown recognizes swing bridges are on the way out.
The Harbor River Bridge is scheduled to be replaced in 2017. Brown guesses the Woods Memorial Bridge will follow in the next 15 years or so.
He hears the complaints about traffic backed up while the bridge is open. The calls are fewer now, he said.
Brown likes to tell people the water was here first.
Now 65 and a Lady's Island resident, Brown has not considered quitting. Friends have stopped working and died within a couple of years, he said.
He is living a dream.
"I've accomplished everything I wanted to do," Brown said.
Follow reporter Stephen Fastenau at twitter.com/IPBG_Stephen.
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This story was originally published January 8, 2016 at 6:46 PM with the headline "Beaufort firefighting pioneer Stephen Brown lives his dream."