Firefighters and their families came from all over New Jersey recently as the East Brunswick Independent Fire Company on Joseph Street celebrated its new administration building and a new fire truck.
William C. Peck While a DJ played rock music, little ones danced and played on inflatable rides, and guests enjoyed picnics under the tents, the event wasn’t just a simple building and truck dedication. The crowd had also gathered at the Willow Street firehouse to honor one of their own — William C. Peck, who served with the fire company for 58 years, including time as chief, captain, president, board chairman and just about every other role in the organization.
At 93, Peck now uses a wheelchair and recently moved to the New Jersey Firemen’s Home in Boonton. Returning to his home turf for the Aug. 28 event, he was greeted like a celebrity as friends and colleagues quickly lined up to speak to him. Peck shook hands with the men, kissed the hands of the women who hugged him, and laughed with his old mates.
“He was always such nice man,” recalled his former neighbor, Janice Boykewicz, who stood in line with her son Robert. “When my son was little, [Peck] would always go out of his way to give him pictures of the fire trucks.”
Peck moved to East Brunswick from New London, Conn., in 1952 and was the first outsider to join the department. At that time, volunteers went through a six-week course offered by the county, said Wayne Lyons Sr., current chairman of the Board of Fire Commissioners. There is a lot more training involved today, he noted. Volunteer firefighters go through the same rigorous training as career professionals.
“They do the same work and face the same dangers,” Lyons said. “The only difference is they don’t get paid. They do it on their own time.”
Many kids dream of becoming a firefighter, but for Peck it was a true calling. At 15 he jumped out of his bedroom window and followed the local fire truck to a blaze. He joined the department as soon as he turned 18. When he came back from World War II, he took a job with the National Board of Fire Underwriters. His position required that he travel around the country visiting fire departments in different towns and talking to the firemen.
“My father loved what he did. It wasn’t really work for him,” said Carol Soule, one of Peck’s two daughters. She lives in Murrysville, Pa., but came back to East Brunswick for the special occasion, as did his younger daughter, Lynn Nemetz of Leesburg, Va.
“Our father was a fireman in every pore of his body,” Nemetz said. “He was on the job 24/7.”
The two sisters reminisced about the ups and downs of being the children of a man so dedicated to his work.
“It didn’t matter where he was: if he saw a violation, he spoke up. We went to the high school and he would come to an event and find violations,” Soule said.
“One year he complained at the church because they had lit candles sitting on branches, and on the window sills,” Nemetz recalled.
“He would get really frustrated with people parked in the fire lane at the mall,” Soule added. “He always told them to move.”
Nemetz also remembers some of the fun parts, such as going with her dad on calls, the excitement of holding up the blue flashing light in the car as they sped down the road to a fire.
The two agree that it was their mother Jean’s support that enabled Peck to follow his passion.
“It wasn’t a problem if dinners were spoiled. She would just reheat things,” Soule said. “She knew how he was when she married him,” Nemetz added.
The two met when Jean was 15 and Bill was 21. They married in 1942. Jean passed away just before their 60th wedding anniversary, about eight years ago.
“They held hands till the day she died,” Nemetz said.
Phil Kelton, who served with the Independent Fire Company for 45 years and is a past president, recalled the days when he and Peck would race each other to fires.
“I could never beat him. One day I took a short cut and thought, Now I’ve got him, but he was still there before me. I used to think he slept in his gear,” he said with a laugh.
Robert Zelehoski, the current fire chief, spoke respectfully of Peck.
“I really appreciate all he’s done. He laid the foundation for us. We were lucky to have a man like him in the department,” he said.
During the dedication ceremony for the new building, officially named the William C. Peck Administration Building and Ladder 801, leaders of the fire department praised Peck’s contributions and dedication. Mayor David Stahl thanked all the firefighters for the lives and properties that they save, and thanked their families for supporting them in the process.
Kelton christened the new fire truck with a bottle of champagne, and the canvas covering the new building name was removed.
Peck kept his speech short.
“Everything I did was a labor of love, that I really enjoyed doing,” he told the audience. “Thank you so much. I’m so honored to see you all. The only thing that could make this better was if my wife was here.”
Later, Peck was given a room-by-room tour of the building that bears his name.
Lyons joked with him about the charcoal portrait of a much younger Peck that adorns a conference room wall.
“This was a dream on paper,” Peck said, looking around the building, “and now it’s a dream come true.”
Visiting the building’s library, he observed that the tops of the bookshelves were decorated with statues of firemen and trucks. “Those were in my den,” he said of the collection he had contributed.
And how does he feel to have the building named in his honor?
“I never dreamed anything like this would happen to me,” he said. “I would have been honored if they had named a room like that library after me. That would have been wonderful. But this is really something.”