Firefighter Josephine Reynolds in September 1982

Josephine Reynolds (born 28 March 1965) has been described as one of the first full-time female firefighters in the UK.[1][2] (However, Sue Batten is the first full time female firefighter. she was 30 when she joined the London Fire Brigade in May 1982; she retired in September 2007 after 25 years of service.[3])

Mary Joy Langdon, a nun, became the first retained female fire fighter in the UK in 1979... well over a decade before Sue Batten

Reynolds grew up in Narberth, Pembrokeshire, before moving to Norfolk to live with her father.

She left school aged 16, and in 1982 she was accepted on a new training scheme with the Norfolk Fire and Rescue Service aimed at school leavers. After a year of training, she began working with the fire and rescue service in Norfolk in 1983, aged 18. She worked at the fire station in Thetford. Three years later she qualified to drive a fire engine.

After four years, she married a fellow fireman, and they both left to travel.[1][4]

Reynolds published an autobiography, Fire Woman: The Extraordinary Story of Britain's First Female Firefighter, in 2017.[1]

References

  1. ^ a b c Josephine Reynolds (6 April 2017). Fire Woman: The Extraordinary Story of Britain's First Female Firefighter. Michael O'Mara. ISBN 978-1-78243-700-0.
  2. ^ "Britain's first female firefighter: 'There was no way I was going to be the weakest link'". TheGuardian.com. Retrieved 18 June 2018.
  3. ^ "Courage High!: A History of Firefighting in London", Sally Holloway, 1992, p.239, 242
  4. ^ "The woman who became Britain's first female firefighter". Retrieved 18 June 2018.


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