By Pam Kiriakidis
Whittlesea Fire Brigade, CFA, volunteers were recognised for their service at an awards presentation last month, which also celebrated 630 years of combined service.
Members gathered at Whittlesea Bowls Club to present a range of certificates and medals, and other additional awards, including the firefighter of the year and the running team trophy.
Five-year certificates were handed to seven members, six members received 10-year medals, while seven members obtained medals for their 15-year mark.
Members who reached the 20 and 25-year mark accepted medals, including one volunteer gaining a CFA retiring certificate for 25 years.
The evening went on, presenting medals and life member medals to volunteers who have been around from 30 up until 55 and 60 years.
Whittlesea CFA treasurer Rodney Clark accepted his 45-year medal and was voted by the brigade to become a Life Member of the Country Fire Authority.
At that moment, Mr Clark felt honoured to be given such a prestigious award that is not easily handed out.
“I was very honoured in particularly because it was done in secret and made it a little bit more special, I suppose,” he said.
“There not given out too lightly, particularly in our brigade, we respect a lot of those higher awards very much, so there not given out willy-nilly as such, so I was quite surprised and happy that I did get one.
“Nothing is ever done as just an individual, it’s not a bravery award that separates people from the rest of the crew that are there.”
According to Mr Clark, the evening was an eventful one, as Whittlesea CFA was long overdue for an awards ceremony due to the impacts of the pandemic.
“The award that was applicable was 45 years, and because of COVID, it was not able to be awarded when it should have been, so that’s why the night was more special, and that’s why there was so many,” he said.
“It’s just you feel good that you did something to serve the community and somebody’s recognised that you’ve done it for so long.”
During the presentation, Mr Clark flashed to old memories from his time at the brigade, as he witnessed a volunteer he visited at a primary school receiving a 20-year mark medal.
Mr Clark happened to discover a drawing from the young boy when he visited his primary school in his more active years,
“I actually took it in the brigade and said, ‘this [is the] young bloke I met him in primary school’ and he mentioned [in the drawing] along the lines of ‘Thanks Rob for coming to show us your hat,” he said.
Mr Clark has watched the club improve in all sorts of areas since moving to Eden Park in his twenties when he joined the brigade.
The brigade in his first years ran quite differently to how the brigade runs now with the annual presentations and increased membership from all different walks of life
“We’re on our third fire station since I’ve joined the brigade, we’re in a ram shackled shed when I first joined,” he said.
“Back when I joined, there was never a lot of members in the brigade, so you relied on the same people all the time, but now we’re very lucky to have a larger membership and a wide range of ages which makes me able to just back a little bit and do what I used to do.”
He said the increased membership has allowed Whittlesea CFA to take care of the larger areas they are responsible for.
“We’re sort of isolated to a certain extent, our nearest neighbour was Mernda, so it’s a fair way away, and we’ve had a very large area responsibility, we go right up to Mt Disappointment and nearly up to King Lake.”
