National Awardee recalls his most active years

By Wendella Davidson

AS a firefighter, Compton Sparman gave 36 years of yeoman service to the Guyana Fire Service, enduring endless hours doing his job of fighting fires, even at times sacrificing his commitment to his family. Then on February 23, 2019, on the occasion of this country’s 49th Anniversary as a Republic, he was conferred with a National Award- The Disciplined Service Medal, which he likened to capping the highest point of his career.

“I was on pre-retirement leave when I learnt that I was to be given the award, and I felt proud. I was ecstatic to know that I am being recognised for my commitment and contribution to the Guyana Fire and as an extension to the people of Guyana. I did it all for the love of the country and I am pleased to be awarded,” said Sparman, now a national awardee, during an exclusive interview with the Guyana Chronicle.

Born on September 4, 1963, to Shan Francis Sparman (mother) and Lennox Lawson (father), Sparman the last of five children, recalled his life growing up in Albouystown. The family first lived in Cooper Street, then called “Hell’s kitchen” because of its notoriety of the area, then subsequently moved to Campbell and James Streets.

He first started school at Sister Canning’s Nursery School, then moved on to St. Stephen’s Primary, then to South Georgetown Secondary where he took a liking to woodwork and landed his first job working with a contractor named Morrison. His earnings were $80 a week but according to Sparman, at the end of the week, his boss would take him to have a beer and then give him $40.

He later left that job and was offered employment as an office assistant in the Lands and Survey Department at the Ministry of Agriculture, on a temporary basis whenever there was a need, as he was not yet 18. He was next hired by the Guyana National Trading Corporation (GNTC) and worked as a checker in the cement bond.

Sparman said it was his desire to secure full-time employment and considered either the Guyana Police Force (GPF) or the Guyana Fire Service (GFS), but was advised against the former by his mother whom he said felt that he was “too argumentative and disgusting.”
What turned out to be an illustrious career as a firefighter with the Guyana Fire Service began when Sparman was 18 years old. However, he recalled that initial applications were rejected and it was as a result of a friend of his brother, Walter Thorne, who he said who “pulled some strings”.

According to Sparman, on the morning that Thorne arranged to take him to see then-Deputy Fire Chief, Wilfred Douglas, he ensured that he was dressed to impress in his gabardine pants, terylene shirt and a well-polished pair of shoes. Thorne told him to wait at the doorway to Douglas’ office and he went forward.
But Sparman said when Douglas lifted his head; “He watched me from head to toe in a cunning way and as Thorne disclosed that he was from Albouystown, he said the deputy fire chief blurted out, ‘Thief! Thief! Bandit! Bandit! We don’t want you; sheep in wolf clothing!’”

Sparman said it was Thorne who vowed for his character and pleaded for him to be given a chance and he was subsequently sent to the then Training Officer, Mc Elroy Small who took his application and promised that he will hear something from the GFS. Some two weeks later, he said Thorne brought him a letter for him to sit an entrance examination at the Guyana Public Service Building on Regent and New Garden Streets.

He recalled it was in 1982, when there was a great demand for employment, as such there some 300 persons in attendance to write the examination and thereafter he was requested to report at the GFS headquarters for an interview.

It was on June 1, 1982, that as part of the requirement, weighing at just 95 pounds, that he had to undergo a strength test on the tarmac of the National Cultural Centre, which entailed him having to run around the block with weights. With a chuckle, he remembered having to be assisted to lift a weighty sack and even to unload it.

He said that due to his weight he found the four months of training that followed his enlistment rigorous but he was determined to succeed even though he saw many of his squaddies fall by the wayside.

Training and capacity building
Speaking of his achievement, Sparman, who retired on September 30, 2018, said he benefitted from numerous local and overseas courses in Monsterrat and Trinidad and Tobago, in relation to his job, which assisted in his upward mobility.

In addition to studying Language and Communications at the University of Guyana, Sparman graduated at the top of an Aerodome Rescue and Fire Fighting class at Trinidad’s Firefighting School in 2002; undertook Fire-fighting Behaviour studies in Monsteratt; Sea and Rescue training in Barbados among many others. He also did a drill instructor’s course with the Guyana Defence Force; a prosecutor’s course with the Guyana Police Force, which saw him chalking up 15 years in the Fire Prevention Department.

Sparman who rose through the ranks gaining promotion of Leading Fireman, Section Leader, Sub Officer, Station Officer, and finally Divisional Officer- Administration, and third in charge of the GFS at his time of retirement said if he had his way he would be a fireman all over again.

Close calls
For Sparman, all fires, in particular when there is a loss of lives, is telling to a fireman and among those which stand out was the 2016 fire at the Georgetown Prison were 17 inmates lost their lives. As the officer-in-charge at the scene, he was grilled at a subsequent Commission of Inquiry, where he had to justify the actions taken by the GFS.
Others were a fire in Norton Street in the 80s that razed an entire block and another in George Street that also engulfed an entire block including the then Fung’s Bakery.

He recalled, too, nearly losing his life during the inferno at the Sanata Textile Mill, Industrial Site, in the 80s, when he and a colleague, Jerome Sankar, were trapped in a bond while the inferno raged. It was due to a burst hose line that restricted water from reaching to them and they nearly suffocated from inhaling the smoke.
They were forced to hold hands and jump to safety, resulting in them both having to receive medical attention.

Sparman also recalled fighting fires that flattened the Kissoon’s Furniture building at Robb and Camp Streets in 1997, and also a fire at the Guyoil Gas Station on Regent Street, when he was hit in the left eye by a hose.
So much is his love for firefighting that he is currently employed as a Safety Officer with the conglomerate Banks DIH Limited.