ENFIELD — When Robert Pollard was 16 years old, he was hired to work at Don’s Cash Market in his hometown of Enfield.

Don Crate, owner of the market, was the Enfield’s fire chief and introduced the young Pollard to firefighting and even took him on calls. Pollard found a calling in the fire service and became a volunteer in 1957. He would go on to serve the Enfield Fire Department with distinction and dedication for 58 years, retiring in 2015.

“He loved the fire department, and he loved helping people,” said Barbara Pollard, who met her future husband on a blind date at a drive-in movie theater in White River Junction. The couple celebrated their 62nd wedding anniversary on July 1, just eight days before Pollard died from lung disease and heart issues at age 82.

Pollard’s family members remember the dedication and commitment he showed during his lengthy firefighting career.

“He would go anytime,” Barbara said. “He was on Moose Mountain when the plane crashed.”

On Oct. 25, 1968, a Northeast Airlines flight had crashed on an approach to Lebanon, killing 32 of the 42 people on board.

“He really enjoyed it,” Jan Pollard said of her father’s firefighting. “Early on they didn’t have radios so when he heard the alarm sound at the station down on Union Street, out the door he would go. He was so dedicated to making sure guys were safe with training.”

Robert “Bobby” Pollard Sr. was born April 4, 1941, one of 14 children, eight boys and six girls, of Elroy and Gladys Pollard. When he was young, the family moved from Lebanon to Enfield, where Pollard finished school.

Pollard had a series of odd jobs in his younger days, including landscaping and mowing cemetery grounds, Jan said. Fire service in Enfield was always part-time, even when Pollard moved up the ranks. He always had a day job.

In 1961, he went to work at Densmore Brick Co., in Lebanon and continued there until it closed in 1974. The company’s bricks, considered by many the best made, can still be seen in buildings all over the Upper Valley including Lebanon City Hall, Baker Library at Dartmouth, Lebanon High School and Sacred Heart Parish.

“It was hard work,” Pollard said in a 2013 Vermont Public documentary on Densmore Brick, which was in operation for 174 years before it closed. “I was doing the dumping and racking.”

Pollard spoke about lifting 42 molds with about 50 pounds of bricks in them, putting them in racks for drying, then turning and grabbing another.

Others interviewed in the documentary said it was the hardest work they ever did and spoke of new hires, some of whom walked out after a few hours while others lasted a few days or a week before quitting.

Pollard also worked at the Burning Log in Lebanon, Johnson’s Home Center and Centricut/Hypertherm before he retired.

To the many who knew him, hard work, love of his community and helping others defined Pollard.

When Pollard’s sister-in-law, Patsy Carter and her husband, Philip, who died a few years ago, bought a farm in Canaan, Patsy said they didn’t know much about farming but got help from Pollard.

“Bobby did a little bit of everything,” Carter said. “He was available for haying and that sort of thing. Bobby was a kind and generous person.”

Pollard’s most enduring legacy was through his service with the Enfield Fire Department.

Fellow firefighters John Pellerin and Wayne Claflin remember Pollard’s near-obsession with proper training.

“He was huge on training,” said Pellerin, who joined the department in 1998 when Pollard was the captain. “He took pride in those young guys coming on and training them.”

Claflin said many went on to full-time jobs in other departments as firefighters, chiefs, captains and assistant chiefs all over the region.

“We fought a few fires together,” said Claflin, who was in the department from 1977 to 1997. “Back then, we sometimes did tailboarding going to a fire.”

When there was no room on the truck and a firefighter was ready to go to a fire, they jumped on the back bumper — referred to as tailboarding — and held on for the ride.

Claflin remembered a fire he fought with Pollard at the Canaan Elementary School years ago.

“He told me we are going up on the roof,” Claflin said. “Just as we got up there, he said, ‘I think we better get off.’ I said, ‘Why? We just got up here.’ ”

Pollard noticed their boots were beginning to sink in the water on the roof, an indication the structure was weakening.

“As soon as we got off, the roof caved in,” Claflin said.

When he heard about a town that was sued because of a firefighter’s death, Claflin said Pollard “pounded on that with everybody. That was his big thing, safety.

“When he saw things that were wrong, he corrected them,” Claflin said. “He wanted everybody to respond safely to a fire, fight the fire safely and go home safely.”

Pollard taught Jan and her brother, Robert Pollard Jr., about fire safety in the home, and later taught his grandchildren as well, more emphatically after a 12-year-old girl died in a fire from smoke inhalation after she crawled into a closet.

“That really affected him,” Jan said, adding that her father was dedicated to making sure firefighters were safe with training.

Known to have a joyful sense of humor — “He was always joking,” Pellerin said — Pollard was nevertheless a stickler for the rules when it came to fire-related issues such as burn permits.

“He would always go to the place where the permit was to be issued, and if he didn’t think it was safe, he wouldn’t do it,” Barbara said. “He was always honest about that. He liked to do things right.”

Pollard, Phil Carter and Jimmy Martin were close friends who did a lot of hunting and fishing together and built a barn at Hillcrest Farm. When Martin died in a car accident in 1970, Pollard became like a second father to Martin’s son, Jamie, who was 9 when his father died.

“He was a great role model,” said Jamie, who owns a plumbing, heating and air conditioning business in Enfield. “He was someone I could go and talk to about anything that was going on with me.”

Martin said he spent a lot of time at the Pollards, enjoying Barbara’s delicious meals and went on White Mountain hiking and camping trips with “Uncle Bob.”

“A lot of great memories were made,” Martin said.

A frequent writer of letters to the editor, Pollard was never someone who yelled and screamed to make his point, Claflin said.

“He was always very professional,” Pellerin said. “If the department needed money or a piece of equipment, Bobby would stand up and say we needed it. He was a leader and cared about Enfield and the guys in the department and wanted the best for everyone.”

Upon his retirement, Pollard was presented with the Fire Axe plaque at his retirement party, which read, “Integrity, Courage, Service, 1957 to 2015.”

In addition to serving on the Enfield department, Pollard was also the forest fire warden for Enfield.

Between work and the fire department, he managed to play in the Enfield softball league and, in the 1980s, coached Midget A baseball. One year his team won the championship and celebrated with a ride on a fire truck through town.

Retirement did not slow him down.

“He didn’t like sitting around, even after retirement,” Barbara said. “He said life was too special.”

Pollard worked part-time with a courier service and for 25 years, he and his wife ran Bob and Barb’s Antique and Bric-a-Brac’s, a business that took them to yard sales around northern New England.

“He learned a lot about antiques,” said his sister-in-law, Patsy Carter. “He continued to learn things on his own as he got older. He didn’t wait for someone to show him.”

Pollard’s loss leaves a gap in the community that will be difficult to fill. These days fire departments have a hard time recruiting volunteers because the required training takes a lot of time.

“It is a national problem,” Pellerin said. “Every year there are less and less people. Young families have kids, jobs, houses.”

Claflin said Pollard was certainly one of a kind.

“This town will never have a person like him again.”

Patrick O’Grady can be reached at pogclmt@gmail.com.