Blyth Headding wears many hats at the Town of Kingston. Headding is Kingston's Fire Marshall, a commissionedofficerwiththe Kingston Police Department, an EMT, deputy director of EmergencyManagemen,and the official licensed county drone pilot. Headding and his fiancee Kelsei Wood settled in Kingston after he started working with the Kingston Police Department.
Then, after volunteering at the Kingston Fire Department, Headding started working to make a more permanent position for himself within the fire department to help fill the much needed role of Fire Marshall. The Madill Record was able to sit down with the Fire Marshal Headding for a short Q&A for the residents of Marshall County to get to know him.
Q: Tell our readers
about yourself, are you from Marshall County?
A: I was born in Dalhart, Texas, which no one really knows where that is. It's really close to Amarillo, but I was raised in Lawton, so I spent most of my time in Lawton until I graduated in early 2002.
I graduated from Eisenhower that'sinLawton.From there, I went to college in Missouri for a couple of years and I came back home. I went to Ozark Christian College for Youth Ministry.
Once I came back home, I didn't really know what to do. I had done several things and went into the beverage industry working for Budweiser, I was in delivery. Left there after five years and went to Miller which led me to Ardmore.
I came over here originally as a delivery driver then went into sales. I did sales for about five years in between when we had moved from Ardmore to Marietta. I met the then police chief of Marietta and got to talking with him about working for him.
So, in 2017, that is when I did the whole reserve police officer thing for about a year then was offered a full-time job there in 2018. I started 2017 and became full-time in 2018 for Marietta spent the first couple of years in my law enforcement career over there.
During that time, life changed again I left over there. I knew the then police chief here in Kingston. I had met him before whenever I worked at Marietta and he offered me a job here in Kingston.
I had just moved from Marietta and was living in Kingstonsoitjustmademore sense for me do that since it wasonlyafive-minuteversus 45 minute driving to town. So, I came over to Kingston, worked for Kingston for a little while; then I went to Marshall County Sheriff's Office. Then left the County Sheriff's Office and came back to Kingston Police Department.
Then, during that time talking to the fire chief, I had became a volunteer at the fire department here in Kingston in 2021. It was all the same couple of months apart that I left here as a police officer ,went to Marshall County Sheriff's Office and came back to be a police officer at Kingston Police Department and during that time of jumping around that the Kingston Fire Department Chief and I talked about where the town was going and the expansion.
We both saw a need for a Fire Marshall or someone in that capacity to ensure that standards were being met in the town. There are State officials but there are just so few of them, they're such a big expense, and they can't catch everything.
In my infinite wisdom, I began to reinvent the wheel of my job description and make one of my own for my position. Setting up how we were going to do things and speaking with council members; to meet the needs and the aspects of a fire marshal for the town.
They saw it as a great opportunity. They created the position and made it official July , 2023.
Q: Tell our readers about your family your re you married do you have children?
A: My fiance and I have been engaged for about three years. I have one son from a previousrelationshipandshe has a son from her previous relationship.
My son is eight years old. He lives in Cash with his mother, and I have a stepson who goes to Madill and he is 13 years old. Kelsei is from the Marshall County area. She is an assistant manager at Lowes in Ardmore. We've been together for five years coming up on six years.
Q: When you are not working, what do you and your family like to do for fun?
A: I have a lot of things going on. I rarely have time off. While doing this, I am also going back to school to get my associate's degree .
I have school work and on top of that, I am currently putting on EMT classes, which I am part of. So between the basic EMT homework, college homework, and then this, there is very little time to enjoy myself.
We live a mile from the lake and I can't tell you the last time I was down at the lake enjoying myself. When we do have time we will go down to the lake and enjoy ourselves.
Q; With all the growth in the area and need for more entertainment options Kingston and Marshall Countyaregrowing, how does that affect the town?
A: There is a definite balance between still maintaining that small town community feel with the need for more tax income to grow and potentially upgrade things throughoutthetownandthat is job security for me.
Q: What made you take a turn from going to school in Missouri as a youth Minister Pastor to ending up in Marietta at the police department?
A: Really, like I said it was just one thing that led to another. More or less, just not financially sound for me to be up there.
I couldn't afford to be up there and my parents couldn'taffordtopayformeto bethere,soIcamebackhome. I decided I really needed to find something to do, then 10 years later, it still wasn't what I wanted to do.
Then I found police work and I was like I really like doing that, that's what I like to do. There's nothing against police work, I’m still a commissioned officer and I still can do things as a police officer. But going to work everyday and being disliked by the uniform that you have onandthatpeopledon'tknow you as a person it's very, very rough and very taxing.
So, I decided to join the dark side and became a firefighter because everyone lives a firefighter. Everybody wants to see you when you show up to help them.
Q:Unfortunatelythatis sad that there is a stigma that comes along with being a police officer. Do you think that there is anything that could be done within the police department as a whole to change the misperceptions people have about policeofficers,thatmaybe moreCommunityinvolvement could help?
A; Yeah, there's not so much here. I haven't really come across anybody that hasn't really portrayed anybody that way in Marshall County. It's just overall the career the police officer culture as a whole is taxing mentally.
There's a lot of things to take home mentally it's just mental health. The state of Oklahoma has done a great job with becoming more mentalhealthawareforFirst Respondersandthatincludes police, responders, firefighters and EMTs.
They have developed their mental health awareness division that they have created and it is basically counseling andoverallexerciseandmental wellness help. They have their trailers that they can take around to the different parts of this state and invite those First Responders into basically hit that off switch and say hey come over here and work out.
Do something productive, do something that's going to increase your mental health and well-being. As opposed to just going home and doing all those things that people say is bad for you. It's the OklahomaDivisionofMental Health and Wellness, they were able to use state funds to bring awareness to community members and really attacking the stigma of it is okay to say you need help.
People in that program come out and say hey we're here to help, we're going to come help you just tell us where you need us to go and we're going to be there.