FACILITY FIRE BRI FIRE AND EMERGENCY SERVICES INS FIRE PROTECTION, DETECTION, AN
FIRE SERVICE HYDRAULICS AND WATER SUPPLY HAZARDOUS MATERIALS TECHNICIAN PRINCIPLES OF PASSENGER VEHICLE EXTRICATION GROUND COVER FIRE FIGHTING FOR STRUCTURAL FIREFIGHTERS
The manuals also remained popular with state and municipal training programs. Two (2) Canadian provinces adopted the “Red Books” as their official training materials in 1955, and the alliance changed its name to the International Fire Service Training Association (IFSTA). By 1962, firefighters in all 50 states and several Canadian provinces used the manuals, 28 states had officially adopted them and the Army and Navy used them on bases all over the world. In spite of such growth, basic production had not changed since 1934. Heisler still edited the manuals, even though his official university position changed over the years, and Oklahoma A&M (State) still published them. The manuals were put together and published from a wing added to the Industrial Arts Building for Heisler’s offices in 1937. The method of distribution was still the same, too. Orders were handled by the university bookstore. What had changed was the number of titles. In the 1950s, other changes began to take place. The distribution of the books came under new management. CEAT Dean Melvin R. Lohmann, who had the ultimate responsibility for publishing the manuals, believed a new distribution method would improve their growth. There was no objection from the university bookstore, since its management did not care for the additional responsibility. So Lohmann advanced funds from his own college to set up a new distributor and placed Douglas in charge of it. This required building an addition onto the sprinkler laboratory at the Campus Fire Station and hiring one part- time and one student employee to handle the manuals. The part-time employee was Stillwater firefighter
Richard Giles. He would serve in that role until he retired from the fire department and became the head of OSU Fire Protection Services in 1960. The new arrangement worked so well the loan was paid off in five (5) years. Douglas hired Everett Hudiburg in 1952 to serve a three-year apprenticeship as associate editor before Heisler retired in 1955 (Figure 9) . Hudiburg had attended all the validation conferences and had written parts of some of the earlier manuals, so he was already familiar with the publications and the process. When he took over as editor in 1955, he was able to maintain the continuity of the program. By 1959, the university offered 29 IFSTA manuals and several packages of visual aids. All of the fire programs suffered a tragic setback on January 22, 1962, when Professor Douglas suffered a fatal heart attack at his home. The programs went through a variety of leaders following his passing. Beginning the Modern Era
Figure 9
As the fire programs continued to grow in the late 1960s, Dean Lohmann realized that a stronger leader would be required to organize and lead the effort. In 1969, he hired Harold R. Mace as that person. At the time, Mace was an elementary school principal in Oklahoma City. Although he had worked in the insurance industry for a short time before getting involved in education, his knowledge of the fire service was limited. He was able to glean some information from his father-in-law, Lothar Smith, who was the fire chief in Edmond, Oklahoma, and a major figure in Oklahoma state fire organizations. Oklahoma State Firefighter’s Association Executive Director Andy T. Miller told Lohmann that if he wanted a true leader, he had one for him. He was right. Mace was originally hired to lead OSU Fire Service Training (FST), but Dean Lohmann soon recognized his leadership potential and also placed FPP under Mace’s leadership. Both organizations prospered under Mace’s leadership. By the time Mace retired in early 1992, his list of accomplishments was prolific. Some of the more major ones were: • Serving as the chair of the first NFPA Fire Fighter Professional Qualifications (1001) committee. • Increasing the sales of IFSTA and FPP products from $300,000 per year in 1974 to over $5 million per year at the time of his retirement in 1992.
IFSTA/FPP: THE FIRST 90 YEARS 11
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