Network News
January 2025
Happy New Year to all our members, friends and donors. This is the first newsletter of 2025, and we are excited to share any information from our member museums. The Network News will be sent at the end of each month; we welcome submissions from our museums (remember, it is called networking). Please send articles, news. events, ideas or questions to me by the 20th of each month for inclusion. For text, please send in MS Word if at all possible, and photos in the .jpg format. It is difficult for me to upload pdf content to the newsletter.
The Houston Fire Museum is looking for help:
Do any of you do a special program or activity for senior citizens that come visit your Museum as a group? Do you offer fire safety education? We are getting a lot of calls for Senior groups and I would like to be able to offer them something, especially since we have limited access for everyone upstairs. We plan on having our upstairs exhibits available to view on one's cell phone if they can not climb stairs.
Any suggestions are appreciated!
Kate Kate Ryther
Executive Director
Houston Fire Museum
P.O. Box 541535 Houston, Texas 77254-1535
713-524-2526, cell 281-788-8498
Dues renewal notices will be going out next week but if you wish to get ahead, you can renew your dues here: Join Us! | Fire Museum Network. By paying online you will save the network the cost of mailing out notices, and free up more funds for networking. We really appreciate your support.
National Fire Heritage Center
The National Fire Heritage Center has several items needing a home. They are offering them to our member museums. The recipient museum will be responsible for all shipping charges. To request a list of items available, contact Dick DeVore at dickdevore@gmail.com You may also ask about donating any items from your collection to the Heritage Center. To learn more about the NFHC visit their website: National Fire Heritage Center – Preserving the Written History of Fire in America.
Did You Know:
The Fire Museum Network incorporated in 2004 after a previous affiliation as a subcommittee of the IAFC. We are a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization governed by a nine member volunteer board adhering to our Bylaws. You may view our Bylaws on the webpage here: FMN Corporate Bylaws | Fire Museum Network
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Meet the Board
Your Network is governed by a board of nine volunteers, each elected for a three-year term. You can contact them through the email contact form on the website, or directly at their email addresses. We are always looking for new enthusiastic volunteers. As you can see we come from all levels of experience and backgrounds.
Bob Heckman, Texas president@firemuseumnetwork.org
Tom McDonald, Texas TMcfire@aol.com
Bill Hall, Ohio bhallcfd@gmail.com
Bob Vallero, Colorado, denverfireman@hotmail.com
Don Dodd, California fireplug25@sbcglobal.net
Frank Taff, Indiana fmtaff@gmail.com
Jim Stillman, Colorado jamesfstillman@gmail.com
Gene Brown, Oklahoma, genebrownfire@gmail.com
Verne Bickers, Ohio, firefighter_ 2515@yahoo.com
This newsletter is intended for our membership, and for all who are interested in preserving and interpreting the history of the fire service. Please forward to your membership, your board members and anyone else who may benefit.