Tag Archives: Bill Lang

Retro R-FH Water Rescue Cruisin’

Fair Haven First Aid Squad’s Water Rescue Unit circa early 1970s
Photo/FHFD media collection

It’s the heart of summer. And with summertime in the Rumson-Fair Haven area comes a tsunami of waterborne activity.

It’s the peninsula way of life. Always has been. And because of it, back in 1962, members of the Fair Haven Fire Department’s First Aid Squad created an underwater rescue team, as they referred to it. The team would exist for water rescue and recovery emergencies. It made sense.

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Bill Lang: A True Love Thy Neighbor Tale

“Hey! Where you going?!” I knew the voice. I knew it well. A Gladdis Kravitz Popeye, if you will. Gravelly, purposeful, with that guttural laugh, he’d yell to me from the porch as he, hearing my “beep, beep” call, would run outside to catch me in my disappearing act before I turned the corner.

After all, it was his neighborhood job. He took it seriously — and he relished the relentless taking care kinda ribbing he so generously doled out. Food was usually involved, too, if he could catch you to get you in for a burger, a sandwich or a Twizzler. The scoop was what he was after. He had that bait, too, but you couldn’t get away without a good grilling, burger aside, a lecture and a heaping helping of teasing. Always the scoop — on what I was up to and how my dad would feel about it all. It was a few million steps beyond nosy neighbor. He had to know. It was part of our neighborhood family pact.

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Retro Frontlining Fair Haven Doc & Mayor

There’s something about memories of an iconic doctor, mayor, house calls, volunteerism and community that soothe what ails the stressed and scared in surging pandemic and vaccination times.

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Retro FH First Aid & Fire Company Family: The Langs

By Elaine Van Develde

With the line officers in the Fair Haven First Aid Squad all women for 2016, we are reminded that it was not all that long ago that it was just men in the squad — really, until the 1980s.

Yet, there is another attribute of first aiders, among other emergency responders, that is worthy of mention. Many times, the calling to help the community is a family affair.

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