Pat Reavy
The Deseret News
SALT LAKE CITY — For as long as anyone can remember, Denny McKone has filled out the roster for the Salt Lake City Fire Department.
Add one name here, and later delete another when someone leaves.
Four decades — 40 years worth of firefighters who have come and gone.
This month, McKone deleted his own name and added that of his replacement, incoming Chief Tom Shannon. He marks the end of an era today, and the start of another — the post-McKone era — with his retirement.
“I wouldn’t change anything I’ve done,” said McKone, 64, who has served as chief for 15 months and has served under eight chiefs.
There is nobody within the department who was there before McKone, and he’s been present for the hiring of every current department member.
“I may not miss a lot of things, but I am going to miss all my kids I’ve worked with in the department. And I’m the senior guy on the roster, so every one of them are my kids,” he said. And to them, he is their father figure.
The most common place to find McKone is in a fire station, coffee mug in hand, sitting down and talking with his employees, finding out what he’s doing right and what can be improved.
That career, however, almost didn’t happen.
McKone’s first official day as a Salt Lake firefighter was Aug. 1, 1968 — a day not hard to remember because it was also his wedding day. The West High graduate had recently returned to Utah from the U.S. Naval Academy when he took the test to become a firefighter. His uncle and older brother were both firefighters.
“Pretty much all my life I had wanted to be on the Salt Lake City Fire Department because of my uncle,” he said.
But when it came time to be hired, McKone informed the city he couldn’t start on Aug. 1.
“I said, ‘Well, my marriage plans have been set for six months now,’” he told the chief. “So I go up to walk out, and he said, ‘Young man, sit back down in the seat!’”
The department arranged it so McKone would start his shift a different day — and have a week to honeymoon before he had to show up.
He began at the old Fire Station No. 12 on 700 South between West Temple and 200 West. At the time, it was the busiest station in the city. And on McKone’s very first day on the job, his first call was to a four-alarm fire at 1 a.m. At 8 a.m., his company was called out again to a suicidal man in a duplex near 800 SouthS. Redwood Road who ended up blowing himself through a window.
“I’ll be truthful, I got home about 11:00 that morning; I sat down and I said, ‘What the hell have I gotten myself into?’”
But McKone stuck with it. And in 1971 he was made the department’s “dog robber,” or chief’s aide, a title he held until 1991 when the position was eliminated. Back then, there was only one walkie-talkie between dispatchers and fire crews in the field, and the dog robber carried it.
“We did all communications face-to-face. My job was to circle the building (of a working incident) and get reports. I was the eyes and ears (of the chief),” he said. “I was the go-to kid.”
During his 40 years, McKone has estimated he has been on at least 9,000 responses, with about 480 of those considered multiple-alarm or large incidents.
“There isn’t an area of the city I haven’t been on a fire on,” he said.
Spend any amount of time with McKone and one is bound to hear multiple stories of fires throughout the city over the past 40 years. Some of the biggest fires McKone has responded to include the Congress Hotel fire in 1977, the Hotel Newhouse fire in 1969, the Governor’s Mansion fire in 1993 and a five-alarm lumber yard fire many years ago on 2100 South between 500 and 600 East.
In losing McKone, the city loses its encyclopedia, said department spokesman Scott Freitag. McKone has always had the ability to recall incidents, places, when certain firefighting techniques were introduced or why fire stations were built in their current locations.
“He’s been called upon by a lot of chiefs for a lot of years to remember why things were done a certain way, and we’re going to miss that,” he said.
Over the last four decades, McKone said there have been many great advancements in firefighting from the techniques used, to the training, the equipment and even fire education and prevention.
“When I first come on, all we did was respond to fires,” he said. “We did whatever we could. Now we have this highly trained group come in. It’s just made outstanding firefighters.”
Up next for McKone is a few months off to get projects done around the house that have gone ignored. After that, he said he might get back into the work force, though nothing in the field of firefighting, or running for an office, he quickly added.
Until then, McKone plans to spend time with his wife, Linda, the woman he married 40 years ago — the one for whom he was willing to give up the job.
“I’ve worked all my life ... as my wife says I am a workaholic,” he said. “She can testify what this job means to me because she’s been my soulmate, my best friend ... and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to leave Christmas Eve to go to a fire, how many times I’ve been at someplace for dinner and she has to find a way home or a birthday party. I love this job. ... And I’m going to say it right out, I may be gone, but this is still my department, and this is still my city.”
Copyright 2008 The Deseret News Publishing Co.