By Brandi Bottalico
The Frederick News-Post
FREDERICK, Md. — When he was in his prime, Marshall Botkin kept his pager on through the night.
“I would sleep through any tone that wasn’t mine,” he said.
He was running calls on the ambulance at Junior Fire Co. No. 2 most days in his heyday. Now, the 72-year-old runs calls only occasionally, and his wife made him stop sleeping with the pager at his bedside a long time ago.
“Age has a funny way of catching up to you,” he said.
The Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States awarded the National Emergency Medical Technician of the Year Award to Botkin last Friday at the fire company’s banquet.
“It shocked me because I’m in a room full of heroes, and I’m the only one receiving an award,” he said. “I’m not doing anything different than anyone else in that room.”
Chip Jewell, director of the Frederick County Division of Volunteer Fire and Rescue Services, nominated Botkin for the award, saying he was the first person who came to mind. He’s known Botkin for about 35 years and used to run calls with him.
“I can’t think of a better person or anyone that’s been more dedicated to the fire service of Frederick County,” he said. “He’s been dedicated to the Junior Fire Company, pulling regular shifts on the ambulance for probably three decades. ... He’s one who goes above and beyond.”
Botkin might be the first person from Frederick County to receive the national award after beating out nominees from 54 other VFWs, said Hugh Warner, a VFW member who presented the award to Botkin.
Botkin is also a full-time professor at Frederick Community College and currently teaches five sociology classes. He moved to Frederick County from Prince George’s County, where he grew up, in 1977 when he got the job.
He became interested in firefighting during his time at the college, and in 1982, he started with the Division of Volunteer Fire and Rescue Services. After his first ride, he was hooked, Botkin said.
“One thing led to another, and it just became a part of my life,” he said.
He continued teaching, and in 1985, got his doctorate. He was rescue chief for Station 2 for years, he said.
His badge from that time is on a plaque in a special place in his house, he said. In the same place, he also has a rock on display that he clung to during a near-death rock climbing experience, he said.
“That badge was pivotal, and this is pivotal,” he said pointing to the award. He plans to hang it in the same place.
His wife of 41 years is also a member of the fire company and enjoys helping people, he said.
Every call is important, and all of them stick with him. He described being a firefighter as “hours of boredom interrupted by moments of stark terror.”
“I’ve delivered some babies, I’ve saved a few lives and I’ve saved a few limbs,” he said.
But if he wasn’t there to help, he said another EMT would have handled it the same way he would have. “The coolest thing about it is you get to be with people who want to give,” he said.
There was one time, he said, when he responded to a call where a man was lying in a bathtub. When they arrived, the man’s grandson had been holding the man’s head up because he didn’t know what else to do to help his grandfather.
“We pulled Grandpa out of the water and started CPR, and the boy is saying he should have done more,” Botkin said.
While doctors continued working on the patient, he walked out of the room and saw the boy.
Botkin said he pointed to the boy and said, “If he has a chance to survive, it’s because of him.”
He said he always looks for what he refers to as the second patient.
“I didn’t want him to be scarred,” he said, wiping a tear from his face.
He said people learn from their life experiences, and that’s why he tries to tell stories to students in his classes, not lecture them.
“I like to take those experiences and make them indirectly happen to them,” he said. “Each one of my lectures is a show for me.”
He has spent the majority of his career at Frederick Community College, but also taught briefly at the University of Maryland and Howard Community College. He has taken two sabbaticals to Russia and considers the Russian firefighters and college professors he has met abroad his second family.
He takes Russian lessons twice a week.
He said Frederick County is home now and he plans to stay even after retirement — whenever that is.
“I should have long since retired from this college,” he said. “I’ll retire when the ambulance comes for me.”
©2016 The Frederick News-Post