EC paramedic teaching after 26 years of public service
By SHANNON CRABTREE scrabtree@leader-news.com

L-N Photo by Shannon Crabtree Salute To Service El Campo Emergency Medical Services honored Frankie Becak Wednesday for 26 years of service to the West Wharton County community. Becak is retiring from the department to take a full-time teaching position at Wharton County Junior College. Pictured (l-r) are EMS Director Steve Appling, Becak and EMS Medical Director Dr. Ron Goelzer.

A long-time El Campo paramedic has decided its time to focus on teaching what he knows to others.

El Campo Assistant EMS Director Frankie Becak officially retired from the department Wednesday after 26 years of service. He has already started teaching full time at Wharton County Junior College in their Emergency Medical Technician courses.

"But I'll still be around," Becak said Wednesday, adding he would remain a part-time paramedic with the program.

Wednesday city and EMS department workers honored Becak on his last day.

"He's been a good friend and a good employee. He did a good job for 26 years," EMS Director Steve Appling said. "I've seen him from the start to now."

For EMS workers the job is one where dedication is a must - coping with the ill and injured isn't easy.

But it's also rewarding.

"We're there because we care," isn't just the company motto. It's the lifestyle of every member of the department.

"When I work with Frankie, it's in the middle of the night," said Barry Hodges, a part-time EMT. "It's a second ambulance call. Racing to the station, it's a comfort when you realize Frankie is there. It was a load off my mind when Frankie came up in that green car (the patrol unit assigned to Becak)."

An emotional job, EMTs deal with people on the worst days of their lives - when they are hurt in a car wreck, extremely ill, having a heart attack or injured in some other way.

Literally working to save lives, they face heart-wrenching moments.

And find escapes in humor - the minor snafu at the station after a rough call becomes hilarious, the stray comment which on other days might get a grin produces gasping-for-air, all-out laughs after the rescue work is done.

"After nearly 27 years of working with Frankie, I have a lot of memories - a lot good, some not so good," Paramedic Ben Altenhoff said, adding his most memorable call to work with Becak was one that occurred early in their career and is fitting to tell on the week of Halloween.

Responding to the report of a deceased person - a relatively routine call for EMS personnel as people die at home of natural causes - the two medics arrived on a location and began standard checks.

"When we rolled the body over, air was released and there was this moaning sound," Altenhoff said. "It was like the patient had come back alive. The look on Frankie's face was priceless."

The escape of captured air in the lungs is simply a natural response, he added, but unexpected at the time.

The El Campo Rotary Club honored Becak as its 2001 Civil Servant of the year. The same year he was named assistant EMS director, a position Becak held until his last day on the job.

Becak first became interested in the fire department and emergency medicine when still a senior in high school.

"I guess then it was the woowoo factor - turning on the lights and sirens," he said, adding he first joined the Garwood fire department and later took training at the urging of El Campo's first EMS Director the now late Herman Novak, a man who was inducted into the state EMS Hall of Fame.

Starting when El Campo EMS was in its infancy, he worked when skills were basic - haul someone to the hospital as quickly as possible and maybe apply a bandage - to the advance life support efforts the department now uses.

In 2005, he was named the El Campo EMS department's Full-time EMT of the Year.

"That's the fun part now, the skills," he said. "When I started, I never imagined I'd be doing what I'm doing today."

But he still keeps the lessons of that first mentor in mind.

"Herman always said practice makes perfect. And never use your patient to practice on," Becak said. "Everything we accomplish we do as a team effort. It has to be everybody."

Now he will be teaching the new team members in El Campo and other area EMS departments.

Paramedic Gerald Ripple will be taking the daytime post although he won't have the same title.

"I'll be taking second ambulance calls during the day with Joan (EMT Joan Rawlinson) and in charge of vehicle maintenance," he said, adding he too will miss the paramedic he's worked with for the past 14 years.

"The best part? After working 14 years with him, I can still get him riled up."

A new paramedic will be hired to join the standard rotation taking Ripple's place there.

Those interviews were finishing up last week, Appling said, adding he hoped to make a hire next week. Serious consideration is being given to those already working part-time with the department, he added, saying they already had a familiarity with the working system.