Throughout his 30-minute review of the tragic Doak Apartment fire, the town’s former fire chief told the crowd at a local restaurant Tuesday night the harrowing tale of two firefighters who, on a cold December night, charged into a burning Wrightsville Beach building to help halt a spreading fire.
One of those men, Jon Dennison, sat in the audience, reflecting on the events of which he was an integral part. The other man, Lt. Robert Wynn, was memorialized earlier that Dec. 6 evening in the plaza across the street that bears his name.
“I go by there every now and then,” Dennison said of Wynn Plaza, where a marker telling the story of the fallen firefighter’s sacrifice was unveiled during the memorial. “It’s hard to hear about it again, I think I had gotten callous and used to it since it’s been 35 years, but tonight is humbling.”
On the 35th anniversary of the fire that claimed Wynn’s life, the Wrightsville Beach Fire Department held its first memorial service for the firefighter, including the presentation about the events of Dec. 6, 1981, by former chief Everett Ward at the South Beach Grill.
Both Dennison and Wynn ran into the burning Hanover Seaside Club building, Wynn said, going to the second floor before being cut off by the fire. Dennison survived after plunging 18 feet from a window, landing on the air pack he wore on his back. Wynn had managed to crawl underneath the smoke to a porch, where other firefighters spotted and recovered him.
With second- and third-degree burns, Dennison spent 82 days in the hospital before eventually returning to service for the fire department that was then staffed by volunteers.
“He didn’t quit, he came right back to us,” Ward said.
But Dennison said that the experience shook him and when he couldn’t bring himself to enter a burning house at a later fire, he knew his time as a firefighter was over.
“There were no more burning buildings for me. When the next real fire occurred, at the Burke house, I couldn’t go in,” said Dennison, who now lives in Wilmington and works as an import/export consultant. “Going into burning buildings, that’s what a fireman does. That’s what a fireman is.”
Dennison was among other veterans of the Doak fire to attend, as a handful of former firefighters came out for the ceremony and presentation. Andy Bessellieu remembers a fire that burned so hot it melted the front of his helmet on a night that was so cold that the back of his jacket was frozen.
“It’s not like I could ever forget what happened, but today is a lot harder to handle than I thought it was going to be. It’s scratched the scab,” Bessellieu said. “Every time I see those photos, I think about something else that happened that night. I still remember everything about it.”
To make sure the event stays in the town’s memory, current members of the Wrightsville Beach Fire Department wanted to honor the legacy of Wynn and the other firefighters that came before them, fire chief Glen Rogers said, which is why they pushed for a public ceremony to commemorate Wynn’s sacrifice. As part of the ceremony, the department debuted its newly formed honor guard, which led a march of more than a dozen local firefighters from Latimer Street to Wynn Plaza to start the ceremony.
“It’s an honor for us that we were able to do this for the official remembrance of Lt. Wynn,” said firefighter and honor guard member Tom Hardy. “We are proud to honor his sacrifices.”
Speaking on behalf of the town during the ceremony, alderman Hank Miller reflected on the fire, which occurred when he was 18, and the impact it had on the town.
“He did not die in vain,”’ Miller said. “We have the department we have today because of him.”
During the presentation, former chief Ward said that going over what happened that fateful night, which the fire department has done every year since the fire, has helped the town apply those lessons and build a modern firefighting department from it.
“Every time we talk about this, something new comes out of it,” Ward said. “It shows that in a heartbeat, life can change forever.”
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