Once a firefighter, always a firefighter.
There’s a lot of truth to that statement, as evidenced by the large number of retired firefighters who get together for coffee and to reminisce every Wednesday morning at Fire Station No. 5 at S.W. 21st and Western in central Topeka.
“It is a family,” said Darrell Dibbern, who served from 1972 to 2003 with the Topeka Fire Department, retiring with the rank of fire marshal and deputy chief. “This is one of the reasons that we’re doing our coffee. We just haven’t seen each other for a long time.”
Some of the attendees served with the Topeka Fire Department for more than three decades.
Among them is Roger Christian, who retired as a shift commander in 1998.
“I was on the job for 35 years,” Christian said.
Firefighters work 24-hour shifts. That means they get to know each other -- and each other’s families.