Hyannis Through The Eyes of Retiring Fire Chief Brunelle

HYANNIS – The note in a teenager’s careful handwriting tells the tale. The permission slip dated October 18, 1972 states: “I give my son Harold permission to belong to the Hyannis Auxiliary Fire Dept. Sincerely (Mrs.) Mary Brunelle.”

Once he had his mother’s signature on the note, Harold was on his way to the career that would last 44 years and take him from junior firefighter to firefighter, senior firefighter, lieutenant, captain, deputy chief and up to the rank of chief of the Hyannis Fire Department. It is the only profession Hyannis Fire Chief Harold Brunelle has ever known.

That’s not unusual. Brunelle said, “People stay in for their career. It’s a real calling to do this kind of work.”

Brunelle, 61, is retiring Monday, October 31, 2016, 19 years to the day that he was appointed acting chief of the department and 44 years since he signed on to the auxiliary program as an eager teenager who wanted nothing else in his whole life than to be a fireman.

Brunelle grew up in a house a few blocks away from the current fire station. He has spent his whole life in this town, on these streets, in Hyannis—a place he loves.

 

‘A Local Guy’

Barnstable Police Sergeant Sean Sweeney, who has known Brunelle since 1978 when Sweeney was a summer cop, said the chief has earned his stripes and more.

“You can obtain rank but it takes a certain person to obtain respect,” Sweeney said. As chief, Brunelle is approachable, and as a neighborhood guy, he knows the territory like no one else.

“He’s a Hyannis guy. He didn’t come from off Cape. He grew up and saw what should be done over the years. He knows the neighborhood,” Sweeney said.