The East Norwich Volunteer Fire Co. No. 1 celebrated their 92nd year of service to the community on Jan. 10 at the Milleridge Cottage. The firefighters provide service to the villages of East Norwich, Upper Brookville and part of Muttontown and Brookville. The company was founded in 1912.

The East Norwich company honored members for their years of service, including Ex-Chief/Ex- President Clinton Smith on his 55 years. It also honored the top five responders, those who made the most call-outs of the year. "There were 700 calls this year," said public information officer Captain Russell Fuller.

Ex-Chief, Ex-President Clinton Smith said of his 55 years in the department, "I'm proud of that. It's a long time. I've seen a lot of changes in the company as it grew. Firefighting is very technical now. Most of the calls now are rescue calls."

They also receive a great many false alarms. Mr. Smith said, "We get a lot of them and in a way it's good. We know people have alarm systems and maybe that is good, [that people are taking more responsibility in preventing fires,] and the result is we are having less fires. For that reason, the alarms, and because building requirements are different now."

While there is an upside to the alarms going off, there is a downside too, he said. "Those alarms in the villages do expose our men and equipment to traffic. So far we have been lucky with no major problems, but it exposes them quite a bit. Today the roads are crowded and we have fast cars going faster. They go from 0 to 60 in just so many seconds. Some people don't believe in speed limits, and add to that cell phones and the fact that right hand turns are just slow turns, and that people don't stop. Added to that, we have some pretty big trucks on the road too," he said.

Still, Mr. Smith said, "When the alarms come in we have to roll - because you never know when one is going to be a hit."

He said the company keeps its equipment up to date. They recently purchased a new ambulance and a pumper. Captain Russell Fuller, the East Norwich Fire Company Public Information Officer said their EMT and AMTs approached them asking if they could keep their old ambulance and get a second one which the company agreed was needed. "They asked if they could keep it as a second ambulance. We have a fairly large rescue squad so it was needed. This way if Oyster Bay needs help, we still have an ambulance ready for use. It makes for good coverage," he said.

Ex-Chief Smith agreed and said, "We have an excellent medical team in our company and can't say too much about them. They are great. They spend a lot of time training and retraining. That's what makes this team so good. Then there are our neighboring companies, if we need more ambulances, there are good teams that will respond from other companies. It's a good fraternity. If you had to pay for this it would cost a lot," he said.

Mr. Smith said, "The ambulances get an awful lot of use. They are on the road all the time and we don't want equipment that will fail on you. As a matter of fact we are running two ambulances now. A lot of time we get multiple calls. There were multiple accidents during the recent snow day. They were crashing all over the incorporated villages, on Northern Boulevard, on Route 106. When you get multiples and get four calls (at the same time), you can call another company. We can handle two accidents. Usually we call the company closest to the scene of an accident. That means calling fire companies in Oyster Bay, Syosset, Jericho and Glenwood since we abut so many places: it's a big fire district area," he said.

In East Norwich the volunteer service concept is going strong. Mr. Smith said, "We are getting enough volunteers. We have our Junior Firefighters and we are getting some additional firemen through them." Jerry Presta is their advisor now, previously it was Robert D'Angelo.

Mr. Smith is a familiar person in Oyster Bay, as the former Oyster Bay harbormaster and was active in the preservation of the oyster sloop Christeen. He is still involved with the day-to-day operation of the ship.