SOUTH BERWICK, ME—While most of us will sit down to hot turkey and all the fixings on Thanksgiving, the holiday meal for one extended family of South Berwick firefighters may get abruptly interrupted — and that's OK with them.
The Leach family is deeply intertwined in the fabric of the town's volunteer fire department. A cold holiday meal, postponed family birthday celebrations and occasional loss of sleep go with the territory, according to 54-year-old John Leach, who has 36 years of service with the department. When the fire alarm rings, it's go time no matter if there's hot turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy on the table.
"Firefighting takes a lot of time and it's a big commitment in a nutshell. I mean birthdays, Christmas, holidays, vacations, when the alarm goes off and if you are around, you get interrupted. If someone needs help, you've got to respond, but I'd say it's worth it," John said.
For the safety of residents, John's employer — the town of South Berwick Water District — lets him leave his day job when a fire call comes in during the day. "We generally get a good response during the day where other towns struggle," John said.
He is part of the extended family that so far has contributed a combined 159 years of service to the South Berwick Fire Department, according to Fire Chief Joe Rousselle.
"This family has committed their life and energy to the town and residents and no other family has had this many on the department at any given time," Rousselle said, noting the Leach family's dedication began in 1974 and is continuing as younger members carry on the tradition.
"By the time their commitment is over, they will be well over 200 years of dedicated service to the town of South Berwick. I am honored to have known and worked with each and every one of them," Rousselle said of the Leach clan of brothers, fathers, uncles and nephews.
Volunteerism waning
A plaque given Nov. 9 at Spring Hill in South Berwick to honor the family details the contributions of each member: Mark Leach, 44 years; Frank Leach, six years and four months; John Leach, 36 years; Todd Leach, 17 years; Adam Leach, 24 years; Doug Leach, 18 years; Joseph Emerson, two years; Evan Adams, nine years; Tyler Leach, two years; and Colby, the newest Leach family member at the department at just 16 years old, already has one month of service.
The Gorman-Schoff First Responders Foundation, a local fundraising and awareness organization with the mission to get young people involved in firefighting, awarded the plaque to the family. Such advocacy is necessary, the foundation said, as the number of volunteer firefighters nationally is rapidly declining.
According to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) report published last April, volunteer firefighter numbers for 2016 and 2017 are the lowest recorded levels since the NFPA began the survey in 1983.
After the NFPA conducted a national survey of fire departments, the organization estimated there were 682,600 volunteer firefighters in the United States in 2017, a significant drop from the 814,850 and 729,000 volunteer firefighters the NFPA estimated were active in the U.S. in 2015 and 2016, respectively.
Small communities across the country are living with those statistics. Dennis Robillard, president and founder of Gorman-Schoff First Responders Foundation, and Rousselle both agree that if young people don't step up and join the fire service, there will be a problem.
"I've heard people say had they known earlier about first responders and the need and importance, they would have gotten involved," Robillard said. "So there's a need, maybe even for the grade schools to suggest this."
The Leach family is bucking that national trend. Their firefighting saga began with Mark, who joined the South Berwick department in 1974. Mark, now 63, with 44 years of service to the department said, "It's been my entire life." It started because Mark had a neighbor in the department when he was growing up. He remembers walking into the fire station for the first time when he was 7 years old and said he never left.
"I just loved it. It's in my blood," he said. "I guess, I'm the one who started this craziness as my wife calls it. You have everyone for a family dinner and six or eight of them stand up and leave all at the same time. I've missed more things; family birthdays, Christmases. You know, it is what it is. I never once said no."
Mark's brothers John and Todd joined the department, too, and years back, another brother, Frank, was on the department for six years. Eventually, Mark's sons Adam and Doug and his stepson Evan Adams came into the fold. Doug is a dispatcher at the department.
Life-saving stories
Each of the brothers have lasting memories of their firefighting experience.
Mark remembers one particularly harrowing fire call in 1977 when the American Legion in neighboring Rollinsford, New Hampshire, was on fire.
"There were six of us trapped in there," he said. "There was a vestibule and I went around it three times and couldn't find my way out."
If it wasn't for George Gorman, the late beloved longtime South Berwick fire chief, who died in October 2017, the incident could have had a very different outcome.
"The only way I got out was George Gorman grabbed me on the way by," Mark said. "He was sticking his arms out by the door and he happened to grab me on the way out."
Mark's brother Todd said one of his most vivid firefighting moments was the South Berwick Central School blaze around 10 years ago. The fire alarm came in on a Sunday morning. As soon as he opened the door, the fire chief was hit by a wall of smoke enveloping one whole wing of the school. Todd remembers the classroom "all burned up." The investigation deemed a faulty fish tank lamp as the cause.
Todd also recalled a dramatic ice rescue of a calf from the Great Works River. He and his brother, John, went out on the ice "in gumby suits" to save the animal after it had gotten loose from a nearby farm. "His name was Jack," Todd said.
But, not every moment is memorable or dramatic. Firefighting takes a lot of commitment, hard work and training, Todd said. "It's a second job. It takes up a lot of time with calls, training. You've got to make a commitment, especially with the training. You just can't show up to calls and expect to do the job, you know?"
Other Leach firefighters also attested to the often non-glamorous and exhausting parts of their service. Mark's stepson, Evan Adams, 28, has 9½ years of service with the department, and is nothing but proud and grateful to be part of such an honorable family tradition. But, he acknowledges the struggle when firefighting collides with real life.
"When a call comes in, sometimes it can be hard because I work nights," Adams said. "You are juggling working nights, which you need more sleep because you're already out of rhythm, and coming here. Getting less sleep at that point can get pretty hard. And then dealing with the family too, I have three young ones so it's very, very busy."
Mark's son, Adam Leach, 38, who is also Evan Adams' stepbrother, agrees. "Like everybody said, It's a juggle," he said.
Adam's son, Tyler, 17, already has two years of service with the department. He also has a 14-year-old son, Mason, and a 9-year-old stepson. "There's a little bit of an age gap so there's a lot going on," he said.
Sleeplessness goes with the territory whether you have youngsters or not.
"Do you really want to get up at 2 in the morning when it's 6 degrees outside and when you get back home, you are so hyped up you can't get back to sleep?" Mark said.
Risk is always there, too. "Sometimes, you know, you might walk out of your door for the last time," he said. "You never can tell what's going to happen or what you're going to see."
That element of the job now looms especially large for Todd Leach since his son, Colby, is involved.
"It makes me proud he's carrying on the family tradition, but I'm a little worried on the other end," Todd said of his son who is studying fire science at the Sanford Regional Technical Center as part of his high school education.
"If he (Colby) enjoys it, that's all I can ask for," Todd said, adding it was Colby's idea to pursue fire training. "It's kind of in the blood."
Those Leach family bloodlines may help the South Berwick Fire Department buck the national trend of fading volunteers. Colby and Tyler, the youngest members of the team, are ready to step in.
"My relatives are getting a little older," Colby said, which makes him eager to take the next step and follow the Leach family path. He said he and Tyler have been "hanging around the station since we were 4 years old," and are ready to be the next generation of Leach firefighters.
That's a good thing, because at least one Leach firefighter is thinking about when he might call it quits after 44 years. "It's almost time," Mark said. "I'm 63 and Joe (Fire Chief Joe Rousselle) and I grew up together. He has an exit plan and so will I. I'll be here probably 'til I'm 65 and that's it. It's a young man's job."
Mark said the physical part of the job is easier now because he stands on the side of the road at the command post. But it's harder in another sense because he's responsible for decisions made at the scene.
"Thirty years ago, I'd do stuff and not even think about it and now I say 'oh, no, no, no, no.' You have a lot of sleepless nights questioning did we do this right, did we do that right, especially if someone gets hurt," he said.
Mark said his eventual departure from the service will be easier knowing his grandsons and nephews are coming into the fold.
Still, it won't be without some pain. "I hear the hardest part is when you leave," he said. "I'll still come here, but the hardest part will be when I'm not able to go (on a call). They tell me it takes a couple of months and after that, it's OK, you'll be fine."
And, he's confident his legacy will continue. "When Joe (Rousselle) and I are gone, I think South Berwick will be in pretty good hands."
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