TERRA ALTA — “My dad was one of the founders of the Aurora and Terra Alta volunteer fire departments,” Richard Webster said.
William Douglas “Doug” Webster Jr. died June 13. A celebration of his life and the retirement of his fire helmet was held Saturday.
“Dad remained as an associate member after we moved to Terra Alta in 1974,” Richard Webster said. “He moved the insurance agency here in 1976.”
Webster said his dad was born in Elyria, Ohio, and his parents moved to Aurora in 1942. He said his grandfather, William Douglas Webster Sr., opened Webster Insurance Center in 1945.
“Dad’s mom, Anna S. Webster, taught school at a one-room school at Stemple Ridge. That was in the ‘forties’40s. I have her pay stubs. She took home 85 cents a week. She walked four miles both ways to teach,” Webster said.
Bennie Shaffer, 77, said he and Doug Webster attended fire school together.
“We started working to get a charter together in July of ’58. We got it in ‘sixty-one’61,” he said.
Shaffer said they didn’t have a building to keep the fire truck in back then.
“We kept it at the community building until we could get a building,” he said. “First we had to get the land to put it on.”
Shaffer recalled a misadventure he and Doug Webster had prior to attending fire school.
“I believe Doug moved to Terra Alta before the Aurora school burned. But he came over to it because he had attended that school.”
Shaffer said like Webster, he was still a member, although not an active one.
“I’ve been a member for 58 years. I started when I was 17. We (the charter members, including Webster) worked three years to get the (Aurora-Terra Alta) volunteer fire department going. And were still working on it,” he said.
Webster said his father was 80 when he died.
“I’m proud of my dad,” he said. “That’s why I decided to do this for him,” he said about the retirement of his father’s helmet and the celebration of his life.
