A love of baseball led 19-year-old Dan Ferrise to join the Okauchee Fire Department. A love of firefighting kept him there for more than three decades. Ferrise is retiring May 19 as president of the department. He joined the department in 1982 so he could play ball on the department ream with his father, Frank, who had joined OFD in the late 1970s. Ferrise's family moved to Okauchee when he was a teenager. "He got me involved over there and wanted me to play baseball with the fire department," Ferrise said. "Of course that meant I had to join the fire department, which meant I had to go to school and become Firefighter 1. All to play baseball with my dad."