After serving the Adrian community for 24 years, fire chief Tim Bartenslager will be heading into retirement at the end of next week feeling good about the direction in which the department is headed.
“I’m leaving excited for them,” Bartenslager said of the department he’s led the past two years — citing recent additional manpower hires and taking on a full-time ambulance service.
His desire to become a firefighter began at Tecumseh High School while participating in the fire explorer program in Palmyra Township. He said he also was inspired by two uncles who were in the fire service. He joined the U.S. Navy after graduating in 1985 and said it was important to him to serve his country and begin learning about the medical field in preparation of becoming a paramedic along with a firefighter. He served as hospital corpsman.
After four years in the Navy, he came back home to get more training with Huron Valley Ambulance. He would work full-time as an emergency medical technician in Monroe County and part-time as a paramedic/firefighter with Raisin Township, where he eventually was hired full-time for a year before coming to Adrian in 1994.