Jacob Mulliken
Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky.
DAVIESS COUNTY, Ky. — To honor achievements both past and present, the Daviess County Fire Department buried its first time capsule in front of the newly opened Owensboro-Daviess County Regional Airport Fire Station on Wednesday, Jan. 1.
The idea for the capsule came from Firefighter Stephen Bell, said Chief Jeremy Smith.
“This will be my first time capsule,” he said. “Stephen came up with the idea a while ago and approached Chief (Dwane) Smeathers and we thought it would be a great idea.”
The capsule, which was buried in a public ceremony at 1 p.m. in front of the airport station, is set to be unearthed in 40 years, Smith said.
“We are looking at 40 years that is typically when they update a station, especially an airport station,” he said. “It will be inside the fenced-in area toward the parking lot. Hopefully, it will start a trend. I think it will be neat to look back in 40 years and see how things have changed. I am putting in a letter along with Chief Smeathers. In my letter, I made notes about the equipment we use, pump sizes as well as how many gallons of water we can carry. I think it will be interesting for them in 40 years to compare what they have to what we have.”
Bell, a Masonville native, has been a member of the department since 2010 and believes that continued preservation of the department’s history is vital for its sustained growth and hopes, along with Smith, that other fire stations in the area will follow suit, he said.
“The fire department is all about history,” he said. “We didn’t really have anything to look back on, so I kicked around the idea of a time capsule. Hopefully, we will initiate more projects like this. I would like to have display cabinets like they have at the Owensboro Police Department where we display the past equipment and the materials that we have used in the past.”
The contents of the capsule include photographs, newspaper articles, equipment, uniforms as well as other various and sundry items, he said.
“We’ll have roughly 300 pictures from as far back as the old downtown station,” he said. “I also have an old work shirt, some newspaper articles, a pair of old fire gloves, portable radio that I hope will be out of date in 40 years, our sleeve patches and I will open it up to the guys to throw things in on the day of. It is important to look back and see where we have been. If you forget the past, you will relive it. To honor these milestones and our progress is important to keep growing.”
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