Sense of History Helps Guide Fire Chief DeRosa

Lou DeRosa may be fire chief of the , but it was a chance encounter with a friend nearly 35 years ago that first set him on the path to becoming a firefighter.

“I was in high school and had a good friend, Dan Philips, who was a volunteer and moved in next to me on Myrtle Avenue,” DeRosa recalled, sitting in the firefighters lounge at the Public Safety Complex on Kings Road. “I was in the backyard and he got a fire call. He tore up the street with his blue light going in his car. When he came back he told me how great it was and how much fun it was.”

That was September, 1977 and it wasn’t long before DeRosa asked Philips to sponsor him as a volunteer applicant. He held an electrical contractor’s license and continued to work at that until hired as a career, or paid, firefighter in 1983. The father of three boys became chief in 2010.

“When I got here, it was enjoyable for me,” he said. “Doing things for others, seeing the result…it felt good to do that. And my dad always said, “Find something you love to do and find a way to get paid for it.

“Well, I did.”

That advice was hard-won. DeRosa’s family has lived in Madison for almost a century. A native of West Virginia, his paternal grandfather worked in the coal mines before moving north to New Jersey. His maternal grandparents emigrated from Italy and came separately through Ellis Island. Once married they settled in Madison where his grandfather became a rose grower and built a house on North Street in 1913—which DeRosa and his brother still own.

DeRosa’s mother was one of 10 children “and they never went on welfare during the Depression,” her grandson says proudly. DeRosa’s father was one of 15 children (“we had very interesting family get-togethers”), and worked in electronics and later, at Ciba-Geigy, while his mother stayed at home and raised the family. Having worked at a dry cleaner before she married, she took in other people’s laundry, ironing tablecloths and curtains, and also cleaned houses, to help make ends meet.

“There was a strong work ethic there,” DeRosa said.

DeRosa is proud of his heritage, and notes that he was the first Italian hired in the Department’s career division in the Eighties.

There was no animosity, but he remembers how his aunts and uncles made sure he knew how the Italians were treated ‘back when.’”

“That’s why I am so passionate about the Department and our image,” he says. “We want to put our best foot forward, so people see us in a good light.

“We have a rich history, and it is nice to preserve it and create it.”