Daggett’s youngest firefighter shows up at prom with lights blazing

DAGGETT — Joseph Menard feels like Superman sometimes — mild-mannered high school student by day, firefighter by night.

“Monday through Friday, I go to school, and when school’s over I go home, do homework and listen to the radio,” he said. “When it goes off, it’s time to go — time to go save the world.”

The night before his senior prom, the 19-year-old Silver Valley High School senior was in Ludlow hosing down a flame-engulfed semi truck.

Menard has responded to calls ranging from fires to flooding, traffic crashes and even a plane crash. As a certified strike team responder, he has traveled to help other fire departments with wildfires and disasters.

With firefighting being such a big part of his life, Menard decided it would be fitting to show up at his senior prom in a vintage fire engine.

Menard is the youngest firefighter at the Daggett Volunteer Fire Department. He started as a fire cadet in Yermo at age 13 and graduated to a full-fledged firefighter about two years ago.

Now, with high school graduation looming on the horizon May 19, the fire department decided to give him a memorable sendoff. While his classmates arrived at prom on Saturday in limousines, Menard showed up in a 1968 American La France fire engine, driven by his father and Daggett Assistant Fire Chief Larry Menard.

Joseph came up with the idea, thinking it would be fun to do something different from his friends. Larry and Fire Chief Joseph Morris quickly gave the okay.

“I’ve never seen or heard of anyone doing that before,” Larry said. “I said, ‘Let’s do it.’”

Morris said Joseph is one of the few young people to start out as a cadet and stick with the program.

“He’s very active, and I’m proud to have him in my department,” Morris said. “It’s hard to find a young individual his age who wants to be active.”

Joseph hopes to eventually make firefighting a full-time career. About eight people have come up through the ranks of the all-volunteer Daggett department to become professional firefighters, Morris said.

“That’s kind of satisfying for us in the department that we’re able to afford young people a stepping stone to continue on,” he said.

In the meantime, he said that lending out the fire engine for the evening of the prom was the department’s way of showing its gratitude to its youngest member.

Department policy does not allow passengers in the fire engines, however, so despite his pleas, Joseph had to meet his date at the prom. His classmates and the attending sheriff’s deputies stared as the engine pulled up with lights flashing.

Then, dressed in his tuxedo with a red bow tie and a bouquet of flowers in hand, Joseph stepped out and smiled as he walked to meet his date, who was waiting with open arms.

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