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Editor’s note: The Raphine Volunteer Fire Department was not the only beneficiary of Dale Earhart’s volunteer efforts. His commitment to his community and his friends ran deep.
When we asked his wife Mary for more details about his work with the Raphine department in preparation for our story on the new pavilion, she offered to write essentially an essay about his volunteer efforts, and we’ve included excerpts from he essay here to give a more complete picture of one of our local volunteers.
By Mary Earhart It all started with Hurricane Katrina in August 2005.
Dale had always been the type of person to say “yes” when most people (including me) found it easier to say “no” when asked to help with something or do something for others.
But in the fall of 2005, the opportunity presented itself for Dale to participate in a mission trip to Sheeplo, Mississippi, just outside Hattiesburg. H e, a long w ith a f ew other Mount Carmel Presbyterian Church members and several members from other nearby churches, threw together whatever tools they could gather and caravanned on a 14-hour trip to Mississippi.
While there, they helped repair roofs and other hurricane damage. T hey saw firsthand the damage and destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina and the personal lives that had been upended.
Dale realized the meaningful impact on others of work that he could do, like putting on a roof so a leaky tarp could be removed or cutting up a tree with a chainsaw. Meeting the people and getting to know those that were dealing with the results of the disaster made the destruction we had only seen on TV personal for him. He so enjoyed the fellowship and friendships he made with the others on that trip (even if the snoring at night was tough to take!). Once he got a taste of helping others and that community spirit, he began to seek it out in other ways.
The group that went to Mississippi that year started the Mission Next Door nonprofit group in the Rockbridge/Augusta area and Dale helped on projects when he could in the early years of its existence.
Dale’s first foray into helping cook chicken was actually on May 10, 2008. T he M ission Next Door group needed money. Dale was friends with many of the members of the Spottswood-Raphine Ruritan Club and they had a chicken pit. So, he asked if they would be willing to help the Mission Next Door group hold a fundraiser, and they happily agreed.
E.R. Brooks was one of the Ruritan members who coordinated their chicken barbecues. Dale had known ER and his brother Jeff and their family from when they were kids and went to church and school together, but they really seemed to bond over cooking chicken.
There is definitely a certain amount of work involved with cooking such a large volume of chicken (as much as 1,200 halves at a time). But there is also some down time where those cooking can sit and chat while waiting for the need for charcoal to be added or chicken to be sauced or flipped or pulled off. Dale enjoyed it all. He was always a worker and willing to step up to whatever task was needed, no matter how dirty the job was. But he also enjoyed a good time and could have fun sitting in a folding chair covered in smoke and chicken grease drinking a Mountain Dew and just talking and telling stories.
I don’t remember how much money was raised that day, but I remember it being a huge success.
Jeff Brooks was and is a member of the Raphine Volunteer Fire Department, and I’m not sure if he asked Dale to help or Dale volunteered, but from that point on, whenever Jeff was involved with cooking chicken at the fire department, or E.R. was cooking for the Ruritans, Dale tried to help.
Sometimes that meant getting up at 4:30 or 5 a.m. to help. Sometimes it seemed that Dale was cooking chicken a couple times a month.
Dale’s assistance with cooking chicken was not without its controversy. A couple years after he began volunteering, he had an idea to create a chicken sauce sprayer using an old fire extinguisher. Prior to that, they always brushed on the chicken sauce, which was a smoky, labor-intensive task using old paint-brush style mops. Some folks didn’t think the chicken tasted as good if the sauce was sprayed on vs. mopped on, but volunteers willing to help with these tasks were sometimes hard to come by, and the spray method proved to be much faster, so in time, it won out, and the fire department is still using this method now.
Dale always enjoyed helping others, whether it was for an organized nonprofit group, or just helping friends out. Almost a year ago, on July 16, 2022, Dale was doing just that, when he was helping his dear friend, Joe Tankesley, cut down some trees at his daughter’s home, when some smaller limbs from the last tree they were to cut struck Dale as the tree fell in a slightly different direction than w as i ntended. W e b elieve Dale died instantly.
In Dale’s obituary, memorial donations were requested to be made to the Raphine Fire Department, the Spottswood-Raphine Ruritan Club, or the Mt. Carmel Cemetery. A couple of months later, Sue Brooks, the treasurer of the fire department, had let me know they had raised a significant amount of money and they were trying to decide what to do with it, and the decision was made to construct a new chicken pit. This was such wonderful news and would have meant so much to Dale.
The new chicken pit pavilion was given a true baptism during the recent carnival this past June when around 2,200 chicken halves were cooked over the course of two days. There were quite a number of volunteers on hand to help, and the whole carnival was a huge success. Dale’s spirit was there and will live on in the hearts of future volunteers. He would have encouraged all to take a little time out of their busy lives to help others when they can. Dale was so proud to play a small part in the role of a fundraising volunteer among the many volunteers that give so much of their hearts, souls, and time every day to the Raphine Volunteer Fire Department. The organization truly is a part of our community and if you live or work in the Spottwood-Raphine area, please consider supporting a local nonprofit with your time and talents.
