This is about two members of the Park Forest Fire Department — Taylor Bordewyk and Mike Wheeler.
On a cold, blustery night last year a call for help was received by the department. A woman needed assistance in the parking lot of the 7-Eleven store in Park Forest. Could someone come?
The appeal for aid was answered by a village ambulance manned by Firefighter Bordewyk, a retired Army Reserve sergeant, a member of the fire department since 2007, and president of the local firefighters union.
This is what he heard and saw.
The woman told Bordewyk she was locked out of her car, which held her food and medicine. It didn’t take long for Bordewyk to open the door, but as he was doing so, he began to talk to her and discovered the woman was homeless, penniless and lived out of her car. There was barely enough food inside the vehicle to make do.
Without saying anything, Bordewyk went into the store and came out with a bagful of groceries for the woman, who thanked him for his generosity and kindness before she drove off.
“We tried to follow up with her,” Fire Chief Bruce Zeigle said, “but she had neither a permanent address nor a phone. We don’t know what happened to her and as far as anyone knows, we have not seen her again.”
What Bordewyk did “is typical of what we do and who we are,” the chief said.
What Bordewyk did also earned him the Firefighter of the Year award from the village.
What Capt. Mike Wheeler did in his 37 years on the Park Forest Fire Department cannot be measured in saved lives or property. But that’s what he did through his decades of service. When he was named to the Park Forest Hall of Fame in 2008, it was written that Wheeler “is the consummate firefighter, paramedic, public educator and fire inspector who always places the safety and welfare of the citizen above his own and his career.”
The Firefighters Twilight Silent Parade, where dozens of fire engines from surrounding communities, with only their lights flashing, rumble along village streets was one of his ideas to highlight Fire Safety Week. He designed innovative fire safety school programs using puppets, audiovisual aids, magic and a radio-controlled hydrant. He taught school baby-sitting and senior programs for more than three decades.
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Wheeler is retiring and a farewell party will be held for him on Aug. 13. Traci Apt at the Fire Department (283-5605) has all the details.
Rain!
If memory serves, after a huge 1982 rainstorm, one Park Forest resident was able to float a canoe in Somonauk Park and it often seemed as if every ten years or so, another “storm of the century” would batter the area.
This year there was no deluge, but someone forgot to turn off the big faucet in the sky. It was much the same throughout all the south suburbs, but for the record, during the first seven months of 2015, Park Forest has weathered (pun intended) more than 61 inches of rain and snow. There was the brutal February with nearly 24 inches of snow and in the soggy months of April through June more than 17 inches of rain fell, most of in our back yard.
To put this in perspective, Seattle, long considered the rain capital of the country, counted little more than 16 inches of precipitation for the first half of the year.
Jerry Shnay is a freelance columnist and can be emailed at [email protected]