The three of them ease back in their chairs, each with a cup of home-brewed coffee in hand. They’re talking. They’re relaxing – for once – and they hate it.

Seated around a white, octagonal table in a 10’x10’, fully-furnished kitchen, firefighters Bryan Schuster, Paul Burns and Dave Maupin would much rather be far from Station 4, doing their jobs.
“We don’t like slow days,” says Schuster, 33. “We like getting 10 calls a day, always being busy.”
For these three, unfortunately, today will be an unusually
slow day. Schuster has already made the call to Station 1, their headquarters, making sure that no calls come in, as their truck is being repaired by Scott the Mechanic, as they refer to him, and won’t be ready for the streets for the remainder of the day.
“A parked car got in our way the other night,” Burns says to Scott, laughing. “There was nothin’ we could do. It’s a big truck.”
As Scott walks out the garage door to repair the cherry-red fire engine number 9542 with a basket that reads “Pride In Service,” Maupin steps out of the room on his cell phone while Schuster begins telling Burns stories of his time as a firefighter.
They’re tales of Christmas morning mishaps, cats stuck in trees, literally, and middle-of-the-night dream-disturbers. But more often than not, they’re tragedies.
Schuster recalls a fire on Jan. 2 of 2007, in which Central Elementary School librarian Natalie Lacey fell asleep in her bedroom with candles lit nearby.
“[Carrying her from her house], I didn’t even know she was a woman,” Schuster says, head bowed. “She was so burnt; it was horrible.”
Schuster, who’s been in the department since ‘98, continues with another heart-wrenching incident, a catastrophe
occurring only three months ago.
“Right around the time of Hurricane Ike, I helped a woman clean out her basement. There was about three feet of sewer water down there,” Schuster says. “Her husband had died about a month before the hurricane, and there was at least 30 years of living in her basement.
“We pumped the water out and took everything. She lost family heirlooms and a lot of her life. She was devastated.”
Pride In Service.
As Schuster finishes his horrible memory, subtly drooping his head and lowering his ball cap, Maupin saunters into the day room from the back of the station. Snapping one of his three cell phones shut, and placing it back in his pocket, he collapses on one of the four ocean-blue La-Z-Boys angled to face the big-screen TV. Without saying a word to his colleagues, Maupin focuses in on a turkey hunting show already in progress. Schuster and Burns don’t pay a bit of attention.
Maupin, a tan, well-built 38-year-old standing at about 6’ 2”, and Burns, a short, stocky 38-year-old with nothing much left of his hairline, have been in the department
together at Station 4 for the last five years. Maupin is an engineer, the driver of the fire engine, and Burns is a firefighter, the one who generally prepares for the activity after the team arrives. However, both men work together once they’re at the scene of the incident.
“It’s pretty chaotic for the first 20 minutes at a house,” Maupin said. “But we all join at one place and do our job.”
Pride In Service.
Schuster, who generally doesn’t work with Maupin or Burns, is filling in for two firefighters that took vacation this week, which means there are only three firefighters at Station 4, as opposed to the National Fire Protection Association standard of five firefighters per station.
“We need more man power,” Schuster says. “Financially,
with the stock market, we’ve lost millions [of dollars].”
“[The stock market’s decline] stuck it to us,” Burns adds. “We can’t hire the people we need. This fire district is down 12 firefighters. We roll back every year, and then a little more, and then a little more.
“We used to get grants from the government,” he continues, “but they have no money.”
With the current recession, Missouri’s government can’t afford to give Station 4, as well as the district, enough money to hire the much-needed man power. Recently, the district was declined a physical fitness grant, which would have aided in the firefighters’ health insurance, among other serious needs.
“We can’t afford every updated thing there is,” Burns says. “Some of our stuff is 10 years old and we don’t have the money to upgrade it.”
“Filling these trucks with diesel fuel isn’t cheap,” adds Schuster. “If the economy is down, the government
is reluctant to give us money. We’re staying afloat, though. But we love what we do, so we come in every day and live with what we’ve got. We’re still going to do our jobs. If someone dials 911, we’re going to answer their call.”
Pride In Service.
Having had enough of turkey hunting, Maupin pulls himself out of the La-Z-Boy and strolls into the kitchen to refill his coffee. Currently, Maupin is a Senior Master Sergeant in the Air National Guard and in two years will be promoted to a Chief Master.
He says, that just like those in the Air National Guard, the district is like a brotherhood.
“More like a fraternity,” Burns jokes. Maupin and Schuster laugh along.
“Yes, this is a male-dominated job,” Schuster says. “A lot of females can’t do some of the physical challenges.
You’ve got to have thick, leather skin, be strong-willed, motivated.”
One date sticks out in particular when thick skin and strong will we’re must-haves: 9/11. Even in St. Charles, 1,000 miles from New York City, the firefighters of Station 4 still felt the effects.
“We were far away, but this is a brotherhood,” Maupin says. “There is no one here that wouldn’t have done what [those firefighters] did.”
Pride In Service.
Firefighters are what many consider to be heroes. Their courage and valor are apparent in the images of ground zero, the flooded cellar of a widow, and the rubble of a 29-year-old librarian’s home.
However, Dave Maupin, Paul Burns and Bryan Schuster see their heroics as part of their job. They all became firefighters because they were able to help people through their work; they were proud to help those in need. They seek pride in their work; they seek pride in their service.
Maupin: “I love it.”
Burns: “I love it.”
Schuster: “I love it.”