By Lauren Gregory
Chattanooga Times Free Press
Copyright 2006 Chattanooga Publishing Company
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — David Thompson Sr. would have liked his sons to become doctors or lawyers, but they chose instead to follow their father into “the family business.”
The job involves working “in terrible conditions with unimaginable amounts of stress for the least amount of money imaginable,” Mr. Thompson said, but “once it’s in your blood, I guess you can’t get rid of it.”
The Thompsons are one of just a handful of families with multiple members in the Chattanooga Fire Department’s ranks, according to department spokesman Bruce Garner.
Capt. David Thompson Jr., Senior Firefighter Jack Thompson and Senior Firefighter Robert Thompson all work out of the department’s Station One on Main Street, though each is on a different shift.
Their father also worked out of that station before his retirement. He is now a battalion chief for the Walker County, Ga., Fire and Rescue Department as well as a registered nurse working at Erlanger hospital’s burn unit.
The family’s devotion to firefighting has created what Libby Thompson likes to call “the family business.”
“It’s a way of life,” said Mrs. Thompson, who has been married to David Thompson Sr. for 35 years. “I guess it’s ingrained.”
David Thompson Sr. started it all when he joined the Chattanooga Fire Department in January 1974. Eldest son David Thompson Jr. followed suit in 1996, as did twins Jack and Robert Thompson in 2000 and 2002.
The Thompsons’ fourth child, Rebecca Johnson, married a Walker County firefighter who hopes to join Chattanooga’s fire department.
“Becca had a choice: Either marry one or be one,” Mrs. Thompson joked. “I’m glad she married one, because if she had become one, it would have been too much for me to worry about.”
David Thompson Sr. said he never intended his sons to follow in his footsteps career-wise, but he understands what drew them to the profession.
“It’s not an easy job. It’s very stressful. But it’s very rewarding,” he said. “Even out of a tragedy, good things can happen.”
His sons agree. Having watched their father handle everything from delivering a baby in a phone booth on Rossville Boulevard to fighting a fire that engulfed his own family’s home in Brainerd, “he taught us if you’re going to do a job, do a job. There’s no point in doing it halfway,” David Thompson Jr. said.
The Thompson boys saw their father as an example in following one’s passion in life, David Thompson Jr. said, noting that each of them works at least one extra job to make following his own passion possible.
David Thompson Sr. was working full time as a firefighter while earning his nursing degree, his son said, “and there were times when we had to go to the hospital or the fire station just to see him ... We grew up tighter (as a result). We knew that’s what he wanted to do, so that made us stronger.”
These qualities will be nurtured in the next generation of Thompsons, as well. David Thompson Jr. has four children between the ages of 8 and 13, and Robert Thompson has an 8-year-old and 5-year-old twins.
Although none of the children has decided what they will be when they grow up, Mrs. Thompson said, there has been talk of continuing the family tradition.