At 90 yrs of age, Captain Reese Bradley was our Oldest retired firefighter. He joined the Fire Department in 1943 and worked at station 10 for twenty years.

He became a Captain and retired in 1972 after almost 30 yrs. of service. Captain Bradley came on the Fire Department during the war. He went in for his military physical but unbeknownst to him, there were so many men in the Fire Department that had been drafted, he was deferred and remained in Jacksonville.

On the last night and last hour before his retirement from Ladder 13, there was a racial uprising at a housing complex. A fire started in a store so the fire department was called out. Behind one of the buildings, shots were fired into a crowd of people. Captain Bradley was hit with 8 to 10 pellets of bird shot in the stomach landing just under the skin. He was taken to the hospital where the pellets were removed. He was then sent home to retire.