In 1979, the fire station was built entirely from funds donated by the citizens of the community. The station started out with 3 bays and a kitchen and has been expanded to its current size of 7 bays with the kitchen and a meeting area/classroom.
The Department, under the direction of Fire Chief Frank Ford, quickly grew from 1 truck to 3 trucks by 1980. Chief Ford served as the Fire Chief for 18 years and retired from active duty in 1994, at which time Martin Lambert became the second Fire Chief. In 2001, Chief Martin as we called him, decided to step down as Fire Chief so he could enjoy life and do some fishing, and Craig Lambert became the third Fire Chief in our history.
The Harmony Volunteer Fire Department is one of 17 fire departments in the Upshur County Rural Fire District #1 and is funded by a county fire tax, donations, and fund raisers put on by Harmony VFD members and their families.
The Harmony Volunteer Fire Department is dispatched through the Gilmer Fire Department on radio frequency 154.235 and uses radio frequency 154.175 for most inter-department communications and fire ground radio transmissions.
The Harmony Volunteer Fire Department averaged 60 fire calls per year in the 1980's. In the 90's, the call volume increased to 75 fire calls per year. In the last 3 years, the fire call volume has increased to 89 fire calls per year with a record high of 99 in 2000.
State Highway 154 runs east/west though our response area with 4 farm to market roads and numerous county and private roads in the response area. With a population of 6000 people living in our service area.
In 1991, the members of the Harmony VFD saw a new need as more people were moving into the area and became a registered First Responder Service though the Texas Department of Health and first responds to medical calls mostly with the Upshur County Ambulance Service and has averaged 35 EMS first responder calls per year with a record high of 56 first responder calls in 1999.
Currently the Department has 2 brush fire fighting trucks, 1 mini attack booster/rescue truck with one of 6 Jaws of Life units in the county and an AED, 2 pumpers, and 1 3,600 gallon tanker.
The Harmony Volunteer Fire Department is currently made up of 30 full time members, 1 junior firefighter and 1 junior fire explorer. All firefighters are trained in fire fighting and fire tactics and basic first aid/CPR. Ten of our members arecertified as either Level 1 basic or Level 2 intermediate firefighters through the State Firemans and Fire Marshals Association while the rest of our firefighters attend the Department's firefighting certification training program. We have 2 Emergency Care Attendants, 3 EMT - Basics, 2 EMT - Intermediates, and 1 Licenced Paramedic.
The Harmony Consolidated Volunteer Fire Department welcomes anyone 16 years of age or older to come to our business meetings on the second and forth Tuesday nights of each month beginning at 7:00 PM or attend our training meetings on the first and third Tuesday nights and fill out an application to join one of the best fire departments in Upshur County.
Please check back here often as we are continuely updating this site with records of our calls and news, pictures of our equipment, pictures of the fires we fight, and pictures of our events in the community. Also please check out the other great sites we have listed on our links page.
The Harmony Consolidated Volunteer Fire Department is always ready to proudly serve the citizens of our community and the counties of Upshur and Wood with fire prevention, fire suppression, rescue, storm spotting, and EMS First Responder services.