By Stan Finger
The Wichita Eagle
MAYFILD, Kan. — There wasn’t a whole lot to do in Mayfield while Dick Goodrum was growing up, so he would just hang around town a lot — especially around the fire trucks.
He was too young to drive then in the tiny Sumner County town about 40 miles from Wichita — or even be a firefighter.
Instead, he would clean the trucks. Finally at 14, he became a volunteer firefighter.
“I guess I didn’t know any better,” Goodrum said with a chuckle.
Fifty years later, he’s a volunteer fire chief — and last month was honored as the Fire Chief of the Year by the Kansas State Association of Fire Chiefs.
Goodrum, 64, is just the third volunteer fire chief to receive the award since it was established in the early 1990s.
“It’s a long time coming,” Coffey County Fire District No. 1 Chief Bill Walker said. “He’s someone that’s done an awful lot for the community. He’s done a lot for fire service throughout the state.”
When Goodrum became Mayfield’s fire chief at 19, his department had one pumper truck. Today, he oversees four fire trucks and a department of about a dozen firefighters as head of Sumner County Rural Fire District No. 8, which includes Mayfield and one rural township.
The district also contracts to provide service for three other townships.
They’re not terribly busy, Goodrum admits. Mayfield has only about 113 people, according to the 2000 Census, and Goodrum said the fire district averages 40 to 50 fire runs a year.
But every one of those runs is important, he said.
“Usually, you can make an impression — make something better,” he said. “You hope so, anyway.
“We don’t like anything to burn down. We like to try to save whatever we went to.”
Goodrum’s impact has been felt far beyond Mayfield, others say.
He has been a strong advocate for safety and training in fire services, Wellington Fire Chief John Lloyd said. He led the drive to create the Sumner County Fire Chiefs Association nearly 20 years ago and worked so that the various departments in the county can communicate with each other, Lloyd said.
He sells fire equipment to departments around Kansas and Oklahoma through his business, Emergency Fire Equipment, and helps smaller departments figure out what they need and how to get it.
“Even if he doesn’t get the bid, he’ll try to help you,” Lloyd said.
And he does it all in a low-key way that has no need for attention, Lloyd said.
“That’s just the way he is,” Lloyd said.
While Goodrum has become something of an institution in Mayfield, he said he doesn’t expect to remain as fire chief too much longer.
“I think I’ll try to get somebody ready to take my place,” he said.
Copyright 2007 The Wichita Eagle
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News