The Mt. Pleasant Fire Department history is much harder to relate in a clear and organized manner than that of any other City department.
Unlike other departments whose functions were always performed by employees who were exclusively hired, supervised, and funded by the City of Mt. Pleasant, Fire Department operations are much more complicated. Since its 1904 founding, fire department operations and history are inter-twined between the City of Mt. Pleasant and the Mt. Pleasant Volunteer Fire Department, which are separate organizations. The Mt. Pleasant Volunteer Fire Department includes the men that volunteer to fight fires. They chose their own Chief from among their volunteer membership, with City Council approval, until 1968 when the City began appointing a full-time paid Chief who employed by the City. The City has always hired full-time employees to drive the fire trucks, but for many years drivers were supervised by both the City Council and the volunteer Fire Chief. Additionally, while the Mt. Pleasant Volunteer Fire Department works under the City Council's approval and loose supervision, and the department receives City equipment and funding, the Volunteer Fire Department made their own by-laws and policies, raised their own funds outside of the City budget, and purchased, owned, and maintained their own vehicles and equipment in addition to what the City provided.
To further complicate matters, the Mt. Pleasant Volunteer Fire Department operates across all of Titus County, unlike the Police Department which has always operated only within the City Limits. Therefore, the Titus County Commissioner's Court provides, owns, and maintains some equipment that the Mt. Pleasant Volunteer Fire Department uses to fight county fires and provides a portion of their funding under multi-year contracts.
Our detailed research was further hampered by lack of a complete and cohesive set of Volunteer Fire Department minutes. We were told that years ago the fire department discarded years of old minute books, among other records. We owe our access to the original minute book to someone who recognized their historical significance, removed them from the trash at the last minute, and has preserved them long after they would have otherwise been destroyed. The Fire Department graciously let us examine all minutes they still have, but since it was a volunteer organization the content varied. The minutes are detailed in some years. In others, they are extremely abbreviated and don't reveal much. Long periods exist during this time when no minutes were taken.
We have attempted to provide the most accurate and complete history of the Mt. Pleasant Volunteer Fire Department possible, within the limitations above. We sincerely appreciate all of the help and cooperation that the City of Mt. Pleasant, the Mt. Pleasant Fire Department, and the Mt. Pleasant Public Library, and Mt. Pleasant Daily Tribune provided us to make this possible. We examined all City Council minutes from 1900 to 2007, as well as all Mt. Pleasant Volunteer Fire Department and Mt. Pleasant Rescue Squad minutes that are available, in addition to newspaper articles from latter 1923 to present to compile the facts used in the history that we present.
The process of how everything inter-links, who does what, and who owns what is easily understood if you are a member of the Fire Department, but is much harder to clearly describe so that others who aren't familiar with the process can understand.
After several attempts to write a "beginning to present" history, which became unclear because of the fire department's many facets, we decided to divide their story in several chapters describing the different functions within the department.
