In 1929, 400 men and one fire truck fought a major fire on Ojai’s Sulpher Mountain by hand. In 1932, during the Great Depression, a number of labor camps were set up throughout the county to construct fire roads and firebreaks. Some of these camps were in Matilija, Hopper Mountain, Santa Susana Mountains, Sisar and Wheeler Gorge. In 1942, the fire district hired its first handcrew. The small group
of young men fought fires and repaired forestry telephone poles that ran across the county connecting fire stations to headquarters. When the crews spotted a head of smoke, they climbed one of the poles, hooked up the phone line and called headquarters to find out the location of the fire. During World War II, the federal Bracero Program that brought workers from Mexico to work in the agriculture fields became the primary supplier of labor for handcrews until the program ended in 1962. After the program ended, the Sheriff’s Honor Farm attempted to use inmates to provide handcrew labor. This proved unsatisfactory on the first fire and was not used again. The Start of today's Crew
In 1975, the Federal CETA program came in with twelve months funding for ten people. This crew was equipped with the Fire District’s first Nomex clothing. The crew sat on toolboxes in the back of the fire district’s old Chevy flat rack truck on the way to calls. In 1976 and 1977, twenty CETA personnel were assigned to the crew, using rented vans for transportation. In 1978, the county’s first Fire Control Workers used old CDF buses for transportation for the thirty-member crew. Over the years, a number of resources programs were used to try to provide handcrew labor for firefighting of wildland fires. The Crew Today
Today’s handcrews are funded by department operating funds and are an integral part of our wildland firefighting team. The Crew has grown to a size of over 40 wildland employees, including 20 permanant full time crew members. Along with being an initial attack fly crew, the crew is also a regional firefighting resource. Sending a full Type-1 20 man crew all over California. During non-fire periods, they conduct prescribed fire projects; maintain fire department facilities, repair hose and small motors, and train to keep their skills sharp. Many new firefighters come from the ranks of the handcrew.
