MADISON TOWNSHIP ─ Catherine Swank said in the fire and Emergency Medical Service, you know when it’s time to leave.

The Madison Township Trustee retired over the weekend after almost 34 years volunteering at the fire department ─ 10 years at Mifflin Township and 24 years at Madison Township.

Swank, 71, said while her heart and mind say she can still do the job, her knees and shoulders disagree.

She started volunteering as a firefighter at Mifflin in 1969 and became the first female firefighter in Richland County. After leaving the position for a few years for graduate school, she moved back to Madison, where she was born. She volunteered at the fire department, focusing on EMS. In 2000, she became a paramedic, the highest level of Emergency Medical Technician certification.

“We’re emergency room rolling on wheels,” Swank said. “We can deliver babies. We can intubate … we give all kinds of medicines.”

She likes the work because she loves to help people. As a retired teacher, she is also a lifelong learner. Swank said she was constantly learning when working with the fire department. There were always new protocols or research that she had to study.

Swank has seen all kinds of deaths and saves over the years. She tried to assure the patients, telling them what is going on without “scaring them to death.” She still remembered a conversation years ago with a man who got shot.  

“The guy looked at me and said, ‘Am I gonna die?’ And I said, ‘not in my squad.’ Well, I got him to the hospital, but he died after surgery,” Swank said.

It was difficult for her to answer that kind of question when knowing the patient will probably not survive.

However, she said the most wonderful thing is to see someone recover from a serious illness or injury because she started the healing process.  

As a long-time volunteer at the fire department, Swank has seen how EMS was introduced and advanced at Mifflin and Madison Township. When starting in 1969, she ran calls on an old, World War II ambulance with only a first-aid kit, a spine board and an old resuscitator.

Nowadays, she uses help from more devices. She can give patients with a heart attack an electrocardiogram test. Before arriving at a hospital, she let the doctors know the test result and what medicine she has administered. Swank said the patients could be sent to a cath lab shortly after being transported.  

It was hard for her to leave the fire department. She has cried a lot of tears, even when writing a resignation letter to Madison Township.

“I called one of the captains here (fire department) and read it to him to see how it sounded … and all I was doing was blubbering,” she said.

Captain Mike Shears said Swank is called a “true volunteer.” She had no assigned shift in recent years because of the growing number of staff. She could show up at a scene when she is available.

She is the last volunteer that Madison Township Fire Department will probably ever have, Shears said. The agency is staffed with full-time and part-time firefighters and EMTs now.

“I’m gonna miss that part of her coming up and just being one of us,” Shears said.