For one recently retired firefighter, the job was always just as much about helping people as it was about putting out fires.
Capt. Thomas Irving, who originally joined the North Bergen Fire Department in July of 1979, spoke modestly about his many years of service. For him the job was never about him, but about the residents in the community that he served.
Irving climbed the ranks to captain, a rank he received after the NBFD merged with the North Hudson Regional Fire and Rescue.
Before retiring this past July, he had completed 30 years of service.
Recently retired Capt. Thomas Irving talks about his years of service.
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“You’d always see the guys going out and coming down the block and they had the old rigs where they hung on the back of the [fire engines],” said Irving.
Years later Irving was attending St. Peter’s College in Jersey City and working at a bank when a friend of his, Donald Joseph, suggested that they take the test to become a firefighter.
Irving studied and passed the test, first being placed at the Engine 5 house where the council chambers in Town Hall are now located.
Sense of adventure
The first night on duty, Irving remembers responding to a two-alarm fire on Cottage Street and 75th Street. He said the person who lived in the residence was pleading with the firefighters to save his pet.
A fellow firefighter found a boa constrictor and brought it out safely.
“So on the first night I knew that I was in love with the job just because it was exciting and [I was] helping people all the time,” said Irving.
He said that it was an exciting job to have, especially since before many of the safety standards that are in place now, firefighters could “hook” into the back of fire engine.
“We had Hurricane Gloria in 1980 and I remember going to different calls during the hurricane and holding onto the back of the rig and the wind would be blowing so hard that your chin strap of your helmet would choke you, but as a young kid that was exciting and you loved every minute of it,” said Irving.
Pulling pranks
When Irving joined the department, many of the members were nearing the verge of retirement and had lived and served the armed forces during WWII.
He said he had an immense amount of respect for the firefighters, whom he described as tough, family oriented and funny.
He said that their antics are still embedded in his head.
“I ripped my shirt on my first day, so one of the captains said ‘Tom, take your shirt off and I’ll sew it for you,’ so I was sitting in the kitchen without a shirt on and then they called the chief and said ‘Firefighter Irving has no shirt on,’” said Irving. “I couldn’t even get the words out of my mouth. They wrote me up for being out of uniform, but it was a joke.”
Moving up the ladder
Irivng’s first permanent firehouse was Engine 4, the same house he walked past as a child.
For eight years he worked there and said that it was a great feeling to be the firefighter now opening the house door every morning to connect with the children walking to school.
When North Bergen expanded to two ladder companies on Tonnelle Avenue, Irving moved there as a back-up on the ladder truck, which often had to extract victims from car accidents.
“Back in those days, a lot more people – I’m sorry to say – drove drunk, so we would get a lot of car accidents on the weekend,” said Irving.
He said that it was gruesome to talk about it, but that his main goal was always to get the person quickly to medical attention.
After three years, that house closed and he moved to Ladder 5 on 83rd Street.
Becoming a captain
After North Hudson Regional Fire and Rescue was created in 1999 to merge five towns’ fire departments, Irving was promoted to captain. He took the test four times before passing.
“I think every guy that takes the test doesn’t ever think they did well,” said Irving.
Irving then spent three years in fire headquarters in West New York helping to form the Regional’s fire safety prevention program. He said that after performing skits in front of hundreds of children, one of the best responses he ever received was when a little girl raised her hand and said, “You’re nice.”
After a spot opened up on the line at Squad 7, housed in the same building as headquarters, Irving took the job. He said he donated much of his time learning the new streets along the waterfront.
After a year on the job, he became a safety officer. He said it was a difficult task, since he had to be a little “over-bearing” with his fellow firefighters to make sure they were performing tasks safely.
“Maybe if something could go wrong, you could foretell that and maybe stop guys from going to a certain area where something dangerous could happen,” said Irving.
Career moments
Irving said that he was proud of helping the community, like when he helped create the juvenile fire watch program, where children who had been playing with fire were helped.
“If a mother walked in with a child in this office and said my child is playing with matches, we’re not going to just show him a gruesome film,” said Irving. “We’re going to have a psychological professional evaluate him and make sure he doesn’t have underlying problems.”
He hopes that in his years of service, he helped form an impression on some of the new firefighters, just has former members of the department helped shape him.
Family life
Irving said that one of his hobbies, skiing, helped bring him and his wife together.
“Her family owned a condo right across from ours, so we were neighbors [and] we started talking and one day she asked me to teach her how to ski and that was how I met the love of my life,” said Irving, who married Armine 13 years ago.
Armine, a professional opera singer and music teacher at Franklin School, has since brought opera into the firehouse, said Irving.
He also is thankful for his father, who is now 82 years old and a closer friend to him as each day passes.
Irving will continue to work as North Bergen’s Fire Code Official, as he has done since 2001.
“We just try to get people within the township to comply to the fire codes so they are living safely,” said Irving.
Tricia Tirella may be reached at TriciaT@hudsonreporter.com.