Army Fire Fighting: A Historical Perspective by, Leroy Allen Ward, captures the previously undocumented aspect of the army fire service history. What started as research to assist a former World War II army firefighter in gathering data for his website http://www.firefighters.mil-fire.net grew into a desire to capture the fragmented history of the Army soldier/firefighter into a book devoted to the army’s military occupational specialty, “21M Firefighter”.
Until now, writers have given army firefighting little more than a brief quote in a much larger book or article. This book covers the origins of the MOS beginning with the Civil War and continues through the War on Terrorism. It includes not only the training, vehicles and equipment used throughout the years, but also dates and locations of deployments for firefighting platoons and detachments, unit rosters of World War I and II and in collaboration with Ted Heinbuch, webmaster of www.firetrucks-atwar.com and James Davis, webmaster of www.firefighters.mil-fire.net and author of, Fire Fighters in Fatigues, Army Fire Fighting includes a comprehensive list of Line of Duty Death (LODD) of soldier/firefighters.
The purpose of this book is to present a concise history of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers military occupational specialty 21M, Firefighter. With this object in mind, it addresses several audiences.
- First are the young soldiers who may be unfamiliar with the historical underpinnings of their MOS. For them, the evolution of the MOS' past reveals insights into its future and provides them with knowledge and pride of the past.
- The second audience is the scholarly community of historians. For these professionals, the work serves as a tool for further analysis of this small unknown MOS within the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
- The third audience consists of those who served in the MOS or its precursors, as well as other members of the firefighting industry and the public at large. For this group, the book endeavors to detail the history of this low-density MOS which represents a small section of the Corps of Engineers.
This book belongs to those firefighters, past, present and future. Above all it belongs to those American soldier/firefighters who have given their all.
The book, Army Fire Fighting: A Historical Perspective , is available in Hard or Soft Cover from AuthorHouse. Or you can order online from your favorite bookseller by using the following ISBN numbers:
978-1-4685-2369-0 (HC ISBN)
978-1-4685-2370-6 (SC ISBN)
978-1-4685-2368-3 (ebook ISBN)
I invite anyone with pictures or information on army firefighting they would like to share, please contact the author at allen.ward@armyfirefighter.com
