All in the Family

The last Williams to fight fires?

Joe Kernan
Posted 2/5/15

We recently received a letter from Warwick Firefighter Dave Angilly, informing us that, with the retirement of Jack Williams on Jan. 16, the city of Warwick was without a member of Jack’s …

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All in the Family

The last Williams to fight fires?

Posted

We recently received a letter from Warwick Firefighter Dave Angilly, informing us that, with the retirement of Jack Williams on Jan. 16, the city of Warwick was without a member of Jack’s family for the first time since the 1930s. It was a thoughtful and articulate appreciation for Jack and for his family, which has been a part of the fabric of the Fire Department since it started. But we felt that Mary Williams’ life deserved a little more detail. We also prevailed upon Dave to send us some pictures of the Williams family in their roles as firefighters for our hometown.

More about Mary Williams:

The Williams family of Warwick has been part of the Warwick Fire Department since before it was formally part of the city’s government. Mary Williams was the secretary to the first six chiefs and was married to the first chief, John [Jack] T. Williams, until his death in 1954.

Mary graduated from Lockwood High School in 1939 and Jack was her high school sweetheart. They married in 1942.

His untimely death at the age of 35 left Mary with four children to raise. She went to work for the Warwick Fire Department and remained on the job for 40 years. Her two sons followed in their dad's footsteps and became Warwick firefighters. But, if you only knew of Mary as a founding member of the Fire Department, you would miss the other ways that Mary contributed to her community.

After retiring from the Fire Department at 75 in 1996, she volunteered her services five days a week at the Blood Center of Rhode Island, where she enjoyed meeting and greeting the donors. As a volunteer at Kent Hospital, she delivered flowers, gifts and cards to the patients. Mary told people it was gratifying to see the smiles and to brighten the days of the patients. She helped second-graders at the John Greene School with reading and math. At Park Elementary she was part of a mentor program and worked one-on-one with special needs students. In 2001, she received the Blood Center's Volunteer of the Year Award. In their presentation, they said, “Everyone who knows her loves her. The donors love her and all of our workers adore her. She is just so gracious and so willing to help.”

Mary received the Volunteer of the Year Award in 2005, “Rising Above the Rest,” from the Rhode Island Central Chamber of Commerce: “Mary exemplifies the spirit of volunteerism in her approach to life. She always arrives with a smile and a positive attitude and her good nature is infectious.”

In 2004 Mary received the President's Volunteer Service Award from the President's Council on Service and Civic Participation.

In 2009 she received the Blood Center's Appreciation Award. 
She was a member of the Board of Directors of the Greenwood Credit Union from its inception until she stepped down in 2008, and a member of the Board of Directors of the Warwick Municipal Credit Union from its beginning until 2007. She was on the Fireman's Ball Committee for 60 years. She was a communicant and incorporator of St. Rose of Lima and then Saints Rose and Clement Church. She was a member of the Rosary and Altar Guild. She accomplished so much and touched so many lives in her 91 years, despite the challenges of Parkinson's disease.

Thanks to Jack Williams from Dave Angilly:

“Today, Jan. 16, 2015, marks the end of an era. This is the first day since the 1930s that a member of the Williams family will not be reporting for duty at the Warwick Fire Department now that Jack Williams has retired.

Jack's dad was Chief John T. Williams. Station 1 is dedicated to him with a plaque in the alarm room. He was the chief during the formative years of the Warwick Fire Dept. In 1954, just a few months before Jack was born, he passed away at home while resting on his couch after working at a fire. He was only 35. Had he lived, he could have gone on to be the first chief of the permanent department, which was established in 1956, but those responsibilities were given to Chief Duckworth and Jack's mom, Mary Williams.

Left with four kids to raise, Mary went to work for the Warwick Fire Department and remained on the job for 40 years as secretary to the first six chiefs. She referred to the men who worked for the department as “my boys” and they referred to her as “Mom,” but most often as “Chief.” Her two sons followed in their dad’s footsteps and became firefighters for the city of Warwick.

Dickie Williams, a Vietnam vet and Jack's older brother, was one of the most well-liked and respected members of the WFD. He retired as the captain of Engine 4.

Jack came on in 1976. Most of his years were spent working on Engine 9, one of the busiest Engine companies in the city. He hardly ever missed a day of work. He loved the job, the sports, the parades, the camaraderie, everything about it. He wore his uniform with pride. He lived it like the old days when a fire department was the center of a community's social activities and civic duties. People might not know it because he never talked much about it, but he has been mentoring young boys without father figures for 30-plus years in Warwick. He understood all too well what it was like to be a boy without a father. In many ways, the men of the WFD back then became fathers to him. This department wasn’t just a job to Jack all these years. It was his life. It’s the house that his mother and father built. We’re all just lucky to live here now.

I was lucky enough to work with Jack as his “backstep man” for the last part of his career and I can tell you he never got tired of doing the job at any time day or night. He would say to anyone that might complain, “This is the job, if you don't like it you can leave. You don't have to stay here.”

He treated all people with respect and was always eager to help. His strength was his ability to talk with people. As you can imagine, there are some very stressful situations you respond to but he was great at calming people down. By the time I worked with him, he had literally “seen it all.” After all these years, he never wanted to be anything but a Jake.

What would Chief John T. Williams think if someone told him that his last child, the one he never met, the son who was only a few months from being born at the time of his death in 1954, would be retiring in 2015 from the Warwick fire department he helped create? What would he think if someone told him that his wife Mary raised his four kids and worked at his WFD for 40 years as a secretary to the first six chiefs? Wouldn’t he be proud to know that his two sons followed in his footsteps and became well-respected firefighters for the city of Warwick?

All of us today who are part of, or are served by, the Warwick Fire Department, owe a debt of gratitude and respect to Chief John T. Williams, his wife Mary Williams and their sons Dickie and Jack Williams. So if you're at the Grille on Main in East Greenwich, look for Jack. Buy him a Boddingtons or a Manhattan and thank him for a job well done.”

"I have no ambition in this world but one, and that is to be a fireman. The position may, in the eyes of some, appear to be a lowly one; but we who know the work the fireman has to do believe that his is a noble calling. Our proudest moment is to save lives."

Edward F. Croker, Chief of the Fire Department of New York City (1899-1911)

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