Raffle winner Jeanne Steele (far left) and her sister Ann Pelc sit for lunch during their tour of the fire company on April 5.
Jeanne Steele is introduced to a few of the 10 firemen with whom she shared lunch. Her tour included firefighter equipment and trucks.
After winning a raffle last month that benefits the Central Early Childhood Center, Mount Royal resident Jeanne Steele was invited to the New Sharon Fire Company for a tour and lunch.
The raffle took place at the school district’s community resource fair on March 14.
“Everybody was going through the line at the basket (raffles) and I was like, ‘I’m going to the one with the firefighters,'” Steele recalled. “They were all excited and there were these two girls in front of me and they’re like, ‘I want to win.’ Then I won and I was shocked.”
The raffle came about after a school district request in October, according to company Battalion Chief Frank Battaglia.
“We were asked in October to provide something,” he said. “It happened, and then I got hit with it (the news) about three weeks ago, and I’m like, ‘I totally forgot about it’. They’re probably going to keep doing it every year.”
Steele brought her sister Ann Pelc with her to the fire company visit on April 5, and the tour itself included firefighter lockers; fire trucks; a kitchen; and the back office, where lunch with 10 firefighters was served.
“You see the firetrucks from a distance, but don’t realize they’re so big until you get so close to them,” Steele noted.
On the meal menu was pasta and salad made by firefighter Jarvis Clement and paid for by the fire district and county commissioners.
“I don’t know how to measure,” Clement acknowledged. “So I cooked for like 30 people.”
Steele and Pelc asked questions about what staffers do around the firehouse and how they would react during an emergency. And it was during lunch that Steele gained a greater appreciation for the firefighters and the sacrifices they make on a daily basis.
“Thank God there’s guys like you out there doing what you’re doing,” she told the firefighters, adding that they should get more pay … It takes a special sort of person I guess.”
