KINGDOM CITY - "God speed, well done, thou true and faithful servant."
For 14 years, Missouri firefighters have gathered in ceremony to remember comrades no longer able to respond to the call.
This year's ceremony was especially poignant for Keith Smith of the Missouri Fire Fighter's Memorial Foundation. His father, who helped found the memorial and its annual event, wasn't there, he said.
"My dad passed away last year," said Smith, who serves as chairman in his father's place. "He was honored last year for his service."
Art Smith, his son said, wanted to build a memorial to firefighters, and in 2002, it happened.
"We needed to build a memorial, and now we're standing on it," he said. "The Fire Fighters Association of Missouri pushed to get this done."
The memorial was dedicated May 18, 2002, with a 3,500-person guest list that included elected officials, pipe and drum corps and, of course, firefighters.
The memorial's centerpiece is a statue of a kneeling firefighter. Smith, who serves with the Warrenton Volunteer Fire Company, said more is planned.
"We're trying to build a museum," he said.
On Saturday evening, a candlelight ceremony honored the fallen. Sunday's service began about 10:30 a.m. to honor 2016 inductees to the memorial's Sacrifice Wall, plus 34 other firefighters who passed recently, although not in the line of duty.
"On an annual basis, we honor firefighters who have given the ultimate sacrifice or who have passed on (from other causes)," Smith said. "Every year, this is a service for those who served quietly, without expectation or reward, in Missouri communities."
The service honored four Missouri firefighters who died in 2015 and another who died in 1935. These five Sacrifice Wall memorial inductees all died in the line, Smith said. They were:
Christopher A. Tindall, 41: Battalion chief with South Metropolitan Fire Protection District, Raymore. He died Jan. 8, 2015, after suffering chest pains following a call. Tindall also served with the Missouri Search and Rescue K9 Unit.
Larry W. Lawhorn, 60: Engineer/firefighter with Orchard Farm Fire Protection District, St. Charles. He died May 3, 2015, while driving to a mutual-aid structure fire, possibly suffering a heart attack.
Two firefighters, Larry J. Leggio and John V. Mesh, died in the same incident on Oct. 12 in Kansas City when both were trapped as a burning apartment building collapsed on them. Before they died, they had rescued several people.
Mesh, 39, was a firefighter with the Kansas City Fire Department, with whom he was a 13-year veteran.
Leggio, 43, was a fire apparatus operator with the Kansas City Fire Department, with whom he was a 17-year veteran.
Dorris Winn Fox, 46: Born April 15, 1888, and died April 5, 1935, in North Kansas City. He became chief by May 1932 and was seriously injured in a house fire in 1934 with severe burns to his throat and lungs.
"I'm hoping this will be a continuation of a process to honor our fallen heroes, who are now gods," Smith said, tearing up before the ceremony.
Lane Roberts, director of the Missouri Department of Public Safety, also came to the memorial service.
"There's nothing we can do to bring them back," he said to the gathering. "There's nothing we can do to ease the pain. But what we can do is follow their example."
One of the memorial's speakers was state Rep. Glen Kolkmeyer, who talked about his father. Omer Kolkmeyer, who died April 8, 2015, at the age of 87, was one of those honored on Sunday for his service to the Wellington-Napolean Fire and Ambulance department.
"My father was an assistant chief for many years," Kolkmeyer said. "I followed my mentor, my dad."
Giving the keynote address was Harriett Vaucher, a member of the Missouri Funeral Service Team. She said her first husband, George, died in the line of duty in 1971, leaving her behind with five children.
"He got a call for a propane truck on fire," she said.
Vaucher said she helped their small department out as a dispatcher. While she went to the office to do her job, her husband and his father, also a volunteer firefighter, responded to the incident.
Via the radio transmission, she heard that the propane truck had exploded, and her husband, his father and another firefighter had been injured and taken to the hospital. She continued to do her dispatching duties until she received a call from the hospital that her husband was dead.
"I did not complete that duty," Vaucher said. "I was now a widow and the only parent and sole support of five kids."
She eventually went to work for the growing department and met her future husband, who became a volunteer firefighter, emergency medical technician and paramedic. Vaucher herself because a volunteer firefighter in 1978, she said.
"And all my boys became volunteer firefighters," Vaucher added.
Sunday's annual memorial took place before the highly reflective Sacrifice Wall, which bears the names of Missouri firefighters who lost their lives in service.
"When you're up close, you're looking at your reflection," Smith pointed out. "But when you step back, the names are looking back at you, asking you to carry on."