Kangaroo Flat CFA didn't hold back on celebrating its birthday this weekend, staging a series of events which culminated in a station open day to mark the 150-year milestone.
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A parade of past and present members, together with representatives from neighbouring brigades, made its way from Dower Park to the Helm Street HQ, where hundreds of community members turned out to tour the station, check out the vintage fire trucks and station memorabilia and sample the sausages.
Sadly, it could be one of the last big bashes for the volunteer brigade, thought to be one of the oldest in the state, which is set to be reviewed and could be replaced with a professional firefighting unit.
Third lieutenant Ben Miller, who spent 14 months working on a book about its history, said the brigade had a lot of stories that were "disappearing to time".
"We wanted to preserve a bit of the history and put it down to make an official record because there'll be a time probably when we don't have a volunteer brigade here anymore," he said.
"It'll be a shame if we're not doing it, from our point of view. But ... the FRV [Fire Rescue Victoria] will provide a good service, there's no question about it."
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Since it was created in 1873, the role of the brigade has changed a lot, its historian said.
"In the early days everything was lit by fire, everything was heated by fire, every time you had a mechanical engine it was fire [powered], so it was doing almost all building fires and things like that.
"Over time, we've got electricity, the population's diminished. The area's gone from a gold mining frontier town to a quiet settlement, and our workload's dropped right off but we've started to do more wildfire, more grass fires."
The disastrous Victorian bushfires of 1939, saw the formation of the CFA and a new focus on suppressing wildfire.
The unit was a bigger part of the community when Kangaroo Flat was a small town, Mr Miller said.
"They would go and train on the main street every week and draw a huge crowd. There were lots and lots of people involved and they had a super competitive running team as well that competed in demonstrations all over the state.
While these days, the team is much smaller and like a lot of organisations, the brigade struggles to find enough volunteers, it is still doing OK, according to its third lieutenant.
"There's a lot of brigades that are a lot worse off than us," he said.
A K-Flat anniversary dinner on Saturday night was attended by CFA top brass Jason Heffernan, who accepted a copy of Ben Miller's book, The Remarkable History of the Kangaroo Flat Fire Brigade in exchange for commemorative plaque.
That was set to go "straight to the trophy room", with Captain O'Brien declaring it would be displayed in the brigade's newly created memorabilia room.
The captain said the brigade was proud of its history and achievements, and that competing in the championships was still an important part of brigade life for the members of the running team.
"[It] is a testament to the strong sense of camaraderie and pride among our brigade members. It's not just about winning; it's about showcasing our skills, discipline, and teamwork," he said.
At the heart of the brigade's operations, though, was the community, the captain said, which was why opening the station's doors to it on Sunday was "the pinnacle" of the celebrations marking the momentous occasion.
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