Bella Casey

Tulsa World, Okla.

(TNS)

BROKEN ARROW — The Spirit of Oklahoma fire truck is like every vehicle Shannon Fargo has worked on, but it's like nothing he’s seen before in his shop at the Tulsa Technology Center Broken Arrow Campus.

Covered in scratches, dings and bruises, the truck is a poster child for faded paint jobs. That wear and tear is American history. And so are the names that line each side of the vehicle’s doors.

Oklahoma students in the months after 9/11 raised about $400,000 (approximately $1 million in today’s money) to purchase the Spirit of Oklahoma firetruck for the New York Fire Department, said Jerry Bogle, campus director of Tulsa Technology Center Broken Arrow. The department had lost hundreds of first responders on 9/11, including 10 who had responded to the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995. The department also had lost emergency response vehicles.

Now, the truck is back in the hands of students.

And it’s on those students — and Fargo, their diesel instructor — to revive the truck after its two decades with the New York City Fire Department.

“It’s an absolute honor. It is incredibly humbling to have it sitting here in my shop,” Fargo said. “And I try to convey that with students … the full range of emotion that both the April (OKC bombing) attacks in ’95 and September 11th brings back.”

"She" — most trucks are “shes," student Jose Saldivar, 17, said — is at the shop to teach students how to work on large diesel trucks and to get some well-deserved engine work.

But she can teach more than just engine mechanics to students, many of whom weren't alive during 9/11. She comes with a story.

‘Back to life’

Most vehicles in the diesel technology shop come and go, Bogle said.

This past week, the skeleton of a blue semi-truck neighbored the Spirit of Oklahoma. A student’s white car and a disassembled tractor sat near one of the large, windowed shop doors. The vehicles will stay there until they’re fixed, and then they’ll return to their owners — maybe in a few days; maybe a few months.

The Spirit of Oklahoma, on the other hand, is stationary for at least the rest of the school year. She’s the centerpiece of the shop and won’t move until she’s drivable. There’s no deadline for her repair, Bogle said. She’ll move to another learning space when she’s ready for paint work, maybe in a year and a half or so.

“That's our goal here for this program, is to get it running and moving, where it’s dependable,” Bogle said. “We won't get it in pristine condition, but for parades and stuff like that, easy enough to go up down the street.”

The truck’s battle scars aren’t on the repair list, though. She earned those.

“That's just part of its history, right?” Bogle said.

The scrapes, scratches and dings are evidence of the work the Spirit of Oklahoma did in New York.

It’s the engine these students are focused on.

The truck reveals her cab-over-engine apparatus when she cranes her neck forward, turning her faded “Spirit of Oklahoma” label toward the concrete floor of the shop. Only the letters “Spir, o, O … h” remain on her nose just below the square windows on the dash. Surely, those will receive a fresh paint job.

Plans for painting are still in the distance. The Spirit of Oklahoma still has a lot to teach diesel students, some of whom worked on her last semester. Others will meet her this fall.

Beisler, one of the students, worked on the truck last year and will again this year. He hopes the experience will prepare him for a career in aircraft maintenance.

“Older machines like this, even though they’ve been through a lot, they can still be brought back to life,” he said.

From Oklahoma to New York and back again

The Spirit of Oklahoma has lived a few lives: One in Oklahoma, where it first was an ambitious teacher's fundraising idea. A second in service with the New York City Fire Department. And a third bouncing among people who dreamed of restoring it, said Mike Ward, president of the Tulsa Fire Museum Board.

A Massachusetts farmer was the first to acquire the truck after it was retired. He had planned to use it as a car hauling vehicle. Then he saw the words inscribed across the side. He knew it was too “special," Ward said.

The farmer tried to recruit someone to restore and preserve the truck to no avail. He posted the truck on Facebook. Former Tulsa Fire Captain and Tulsa Fire Museum board member Mike Burgess spotted the truck and teamed with Calera Fire-Rescue, a fire department in southern Oklahoma. Funding restraints halted their restoration.

Burgess bought the truck and gifted it to Tulsa Fire Museum officials, who partnered with Tulsa Technology Center.

Ward remembers all of it, from children raising money to when the truck returned to Oklahoma. A story like that sticks with a fireman like Ward — his family has been part of the Tulsa Fire Department since 1928.

“I think it’s an essential, big part of Oklahoma history,” he said while visiting the truck.

The Spirit of Oklahoma is a rescue firetruck — no ladder or water tank, only tools and equipment that facilitate rescue missions: gear used in scuba, structural collapse and vehicle extraction rescues.

“They’re basically the Green Berets of the fire department,” Ward said.

The truck is also equipped to help rescue firefighters as a tribute to the 10 first responders whose names grace the side of the truck.

‘Never forget’

“We’ll watch people say, ‘We’ll never forget,’ but they do when life goes on,” Ward said.

He compared it to Pearl Harbor. He can read about it, but he’ll never remember or experience it.

Many students working on the Spirit of Oklahoma can't remember 9/11. The same goes for younger members of the Tulsa Fire Department.

The Spirit of Oklahoma sports 9/11 reminders. The words “We Will Never Forget” travel down each side of the truck, along with a message from Oklahoma to New York that states 9/11 forged a permanent bond between the people in both states.

The Spirit of Oklahoma carries the names of the 10 members of the New York Task Force-1 who were activated for the Oklahoma City Bombing and died on 9/11: Special Operations Chief Raymond M. Downey, FDNY; John J. Fanning, FDNY; Terence Hatton, FDNY; Kevin Dowdell, FDNY; Michael Esposito, FDNY; Peter Martin, FDNY; William Lake, FDNY; Claude D. Richards, NYPD; Michael Curtain, NYPD; and Thomas Langone, NYPD.

© 2026 Tulsa World, Okla.. Visit www.tulsaworld.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.