CALLAWAY, Va. – The Callaway Volunteer Fire Department lost one of its finest men to the coronavirus this past weekend, but the legacy of Mike Webb lives on.
Number 355 will never be forgotten in Callaway.
It was the firefighter number assigned to 53-year-old Mike who passed away after battling coronavirus for five weeks.
Mike served with the Callaway Volunteer Fire Department for 35 years.
Callaway Fire Chief and Mike’s uncle, James Webb, said Mike always had to be first.
“Always answering the calls,” he said. “Always first one there. On the radio. All the time.”
After the service at Piedmont Presbyterian Church, a line of flashing lights filled the streets.
Dozens of Callaway Elementary School children rushed outside to wave American flags to say their goodbyes.
A crowd Mike’s nephew, Isaiah Craighead, imagined would happen.
“I wouldn’t expect anything less,’ he said. “There’s nobody in the community he didn’t know.”
Webb was carried in an old fashion firetruck that was Mike’s pride and joy.
“It was the oldest in our fleet and when we went to sell it he had taken so much care of this truck, we offered it to him first,” Callaway Fire Assistant Chief Cody Williams said. “And he ended up purchasing it from the fire department. He kept it up. Cleaned it up.”
Craighead said he looked up to his uncle Mike and decided to follow in his footsteps by becoming a firefighter at 16 years old too.
“He was always there any time of day any time of night. He was always there. If we had more people like him, we would not have trouble with anything.”