Sports leads to 50 years of dedication from unsung hero
Woodlawn Fire Department deputy chief was shaped by his time as a Parkland football player
Playing high school sports opens the doors to numerous avenues in life.
A select few go on to become college and professional athletes. Others become coaches. Most others get into a variety of other fields that aren’t directly involved with sports, but require many of the things sports teaches you. Take Rich Tice for example. He recently celebrated his 50th anniversary with the Woodlawn Fire Department, a volunteer unit serving South Whitehall Township.
Tice is the department’s deputy chief, working under the leadership of chief Barry Search, another longtime volunteer firefighter and a well-known in local sports since he is Parkland High’s softball coach.
How did sports help shape Tice’s career?
“Honestly the biggest thing is the teamwork,” Tice said. “You have to work together. We don’t all have to be best friends, but whether it’s running a play or fighting a fire, you have to work together for a common goal. Winning a football game or having a successful fire call, it takes teamwork to make that happen.”
Tice, who is the brother of Parkland’s assistant athletic director Bob Tice and the husband of the former Debbie Heller who was also involved with sports for many years as a volleyball coach, played for legendary football coach Joe Gerencser at Parkland in the early 1970s.
As junior in the fall of 1973, he helped the Trojans go 10-0, joining the 1967 squad as the only unbeaten football teams in school history.
He was a tight end/ defensive end on the ‘73 team and while Gerencser invited a college coach into visit Tice, he was never interested in playing college football.
“I was a union carpenter and a construction superintendent for Alvin H. Butz Company my whole career,” Tice said. “But I started chasing fire trucks when I learned to ride my bike. Eventually when I was 15 I could go to the station and train, but you couldn’t run fire calls until you were 16. So that started 50 years ago before that ‘73 football season.”
Woodlawn has been in existence for 95 years, serving the community.
Anything that has survived that long must be doing things right and it’s people like Tice who have made sure Woodlawn does things right.
“I can’t emphasize enough the importance of teamwork,” he said. “Like a team, you want to take care of problems and make a bad situation better. When you get a call, you know that no one is calling us to invite us to a picnic. They’re calling us because they’re having a bad day or the worst day of their lives. Sometimes we can get there and make things better, but they all don’t turn out that way. That’s the downfall of our job. Sometimes people lose and that’s the hard part.”
Woodlawn has 60 members, which is a good number.
“Other companies are struggling, but we’re doing quite well,” Search said. “We don’t get a lot of athletes because if you’re involved in sports, it’s really tough to also be involved with a fire company. Because there’s a lot of demand and training.”
Search, who has been with Woodlawn for 47 years, said running a fire department is a lot like coaching a team.
“It’s the same deal,” he said. “You have to deal with the same drama, you’re dealing with different personalities that don’t always mix well and so on.”
Search and Tice are longtime friends and it was Tice who encouraged Search to get involved.
“He has been a very valuable asset to this community,” Tice said. “His knowledge of science and hazardous materials and the way he teaches and trains young firefighters has been huge for us. So, getting him involved was a good pick by me and a good choice by him.”
Search said it takes a special person for anyone to sustain a 50-year career like firefighting.
“It is a tremendous accomplishing for Rich and he has done a superb job in everything he has done,” Search said. “He has done a lot of safety stuff for us and in this day and age, the safety is really important. He keeps our people safe and everybody on their toes. His knowledge in the construction business has been paramount as far as knowing the things we have to do to fight fires, including structural collapses.”
When Tice started, 50 calls per year were about the average. But now it’s close to 900 and while Woodlawn covers about the same area, the number of homes and people within the same area has grown greatly.
“There are more accidents and drug overdoses than there used to be,” he said. “If somebody is unconscious or going through a cardiac arrest, we can sometimes get there faster than an ambulance, so we make those runs.”
Tice said as a member of volunteer department, you’re never really off. The bell rings and you try to make it unless you’re at a party and have already enjoyed a beer.
Bob Tice is very proud of his brother.
“He’s my big brother and a big reason I am the person I am,” Bob Tice said. “Rich and my dad, Robert, were such positive role models. He was eight years older than and you look up to him and admire him, but he’d give it to you pretty good every so often. But a big reason I played football was my brother and the reason I wore No. 86 was my brother. I even ran with Woodlawn for 11 years and I enjoyed it.”
Rich Tice was honored at a banquet on May 6 and his mother, Lois, attended at the age of 95.
“Rich’s kids were all there, including one son who came in from California, and the whole night was emotional,” Bob Tice said. “If I am not mistaken, Rich is now the longest tenured firefighter South Whitehall has ever had.”
Rich’s wife, Debbie, also works at Woodlawn and provides emotional support because putting out fires and taking care of injuries are just part of the job of a first responder.
“She does a fantastic job with helping people through their crisis,” Rich Tice said. “I don’t know why it took so long to bring her aboard, but she has been a great asset for the company.”
The community is blessed to have such dedicated people involved for so many years.
“It’s really a credit to my parents because they taught me how to work hard and said if you’re going to do something, do it all the way,” Rich Tice said. “I took that message to heart and if I had to do it all over again, I would.”