This personal memoir explores the evolution of volunteer fire departments into emergency medical services and First Responders, as evidenced by the history of the College Township Fire Department in Gambier, Ohio. The author served as a volunteer member of the department for thirty years, while also serving as a professor of psychology at Kenyon College. The transition from fighting local fires to providing on-call emergency medical responses changed the nature of these departments – fundamentally changed what they do – and echoes of that transition persist to this day.