Fire Chief Anthony Lincoln Retires on May 16

On his first day as a full-time Georgetown firefighter back in 1979, Anthony Lincoln reported for duty at 7 a.m. After a 90-minute orientation from Wilburn Barker, one of the other full-time firefighters at Fire Station 1, Barker tossed the keys to the 21-year-old and said, “It’s yours,” leaving Lincoln on his own.

On Friday, after 29 years of reporting for duty at 103 West Ninth Street, Georgetown Fire Chief Anthony Lincoln will turn over the keys to the old fire house. Lincoln retires from the City tomorrow.

The Georgetown Fire Department will hold a retirement ceremony for Lincoln on Friday, May 16. The ceremony starts at 3 p.m. at the new Fire Station 1, located at 301 Industrial Avenue. The public is invited to the event, which will include a final inspection by Chief Lincoln, a flag presentation by the Georgetown Fire Department Honor Guard, a “last alarm” call, and music by the Georgetown Fire Department Pipes and Drums band.

Lincoln has seen enormous changes in his four decades as a volunteer and professional firefighter. “I started running calls at age 10,” says Lincoln, who tagged along with his father, Ernest Lincoln, a volunteer firefighter in Georgetown. As a teenager, Anthony Lincoln volunteered for the department as an Explorer, and he later attended fire school.

After he started as a full-time firefighter, Lincoln would still come to work as volunteer on his days off, earning up to $3.00 per call. At that time there were only two fire stations in Georgetown and four full-time firefighters with about 30 volunteer firefighters. Now there are now four fire stations and 66 full-time firefighters.

Sometimes in the early days, Lincoln was alone when he arrived at a burning building. “Many times I have gone into a structure myself. It was a different time and era,” says Lincoln. “You had to make a call if you could make a difference or not.”

With only four firefighters on staff to cover two stations, Lincoln would sometimes work 72 or even 96 hours straight. “Forty-eights were common. And you took them, because that was more money.”

Lincoln was promoted to captain in 1985, and since that time, he has been in charge of designing and putting out for bid all of the department’s new fire trucks, which now total 12. “All those brush fire trucks are his design,” says Don Jansen, a fire inspector with the City and former firefighter who also started in 1979.

Lincoln was named Georgetown’s fire chief in 1999. The next year, he helped to create the SAFE Team, which is a group of firefighters that perform a safety-themed puppet and clown show at local elementary schools each year. Police officers later joined the group. Lincoln has served as the script-writer, set-builder, sound technician, and behind-the-scenes worker for the SAFE Team from the beginning.

During his tenure as fire chief, Lincoln has opened three new fire stations, including Fire Station 3 in Sun City, Fire Station 4 on Airport Road, and the new Fire Station 1 at 301 Industrial Avenue. Lincoln has charted plans for eight to 10 more stations to serve future growth, including three in the next seven years.

Among his proudest achievements is the recent upgrade in Georgetown’s Insurance Service Office rating from a 4 to a 2. The rating is a comprehensive assessment of the fire department’s effectiveness, and the move to an ISO rating of 2 means that Georgetown is among the top three percent of fire departments in Texas. Only one percent of fire departments in the U.S. are rated in the top two classes.

On Friday, Lincoln will say his goodbyes to his fellow employees, but he won’t be going home to watch television. On Monday, he starts as a captain for the 12-member Liberty Hill Fire Department. The move will mean that Lincoln will leave an 8-to-5 schedule to go back “on shift,” working 24 hours on and 48 hours off. In his years as the top administrator for the fire department, Lincoln says he has always missed being a front-line emergency responder.

“When you’re running calls, you’re immediately seeing that you’re making a difference,” says Lincoln.

A difference is what Anthony Lincoln has made in 29 years of service for the City of Georgetown.

To contact the Georgetown Fire Department, call (512) 930-3473, or email fire@georgetowntx.org.