THE MAN IN THE ARENA
Remembering T. Dustin “Dusty” Alward
Dustin “Dusty” Alward was a lifelong resident of Randolph and a 1950 graduate of the old Stetson High School. After graduating high school, Dusty served for four years in the Air Force during the Korean War.
While Dusty was in the service, he pitched for the Far East Air Force baseball team and his team went on to win the Far East World Series. After his tour, Dusty pursued his dream of playing professional baseball. Dusty was drafted by the New York Yankees and played for their farm team in Lubbock, Texas from 1954 to 1955.
Dusty Alward returned home to Randolph in 1955 and joined the Randolph Fire Department in 1957. He rose to the rank of captain and remained a firefighter for more than 30 years.
Dustin loved being a firefighter and helping people. As a firefighter, he took on an active role in the community and advocated for his fellow firefighters at every level of government.
He became President of the Local 1268 Randolph Fire Department and was active in the state union. In 1970, he was elected State Legislative Agent for the Professional Firefighters of Massachusetts (PFFM) Four years later, he was elected President of the PFFM and held that position for 15 years until his untimely passing. While serving as President of the PFFM, Dustin was also the Third District Vice President of the International Association of Fire Fighters at the national level.
In 1975, Dusty was appointed as a Trustee for the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education by Governor Francis Sargent, representing organized labor. In 1982 and again in 1986, Governor Michael Dukakis appointed Dusty as the firefighter’s representative to the State Joint Labor Management Board that resolved collective bargaining disputes, and the PRIM Board that oversaw pension investments.
In 1989, Governor Dukakis posthumously dedicated the Massachusetts Fire Academy in Stowe, MA in Dusty’s name. A fitting commemoration to a man who devoted his life to serving others, the Captain T. Dustin “Dusty” Alward Massachusetts Firefighting Academy continues to educate the men and women who serve our communities every day.
Through the T. Dustin Alward Scholarship, Dusty’s family shares his legacy with the next generation by financially supporting graduating high school seniors who are children or grandchildren of members of the Professional Fire Fighters of Massachusetts (PFFM).
Each September, the Professional Fire Fighters of Massachusetts host a golf tournament in support of the T. Dustin Alward Scholarship to help support the firefighter community with the cost of college and to pass Dusty's legacy on from one generation to the next. Dusty's family is grateful to the PFFM for their continued commitment and support.
THEODORE ROOSEVELT
The Man in the Arena
“The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”