Giving back by helping out
Frog Pond Volunteer Fire Department Chief Robert Shook’s busy life revolves around two things — service and family.
“We’re wide open all the time,” he said with a laugh as he described his family and his various jobs.
Shook, a U.S. Army National Guard veteran, does more than serve as chief of a volunteer fire department.
A husband and father to five children between two and 28 years old, he is also a volunteer firefighter at both Bear Creek Fire Department and Russellville Fire Department, and a business owner to boot.
The combination of jobs keeps Shook on the road. He said he frequently travels hours each day for one business or another.
“I own a RV repair and handyman service,” Shook explained, noting that while he has been in the RV repair business for around 15 years, it has been two years since he started his own operation.
“It’s a mobile business,” he said. “I travel out to people and work on their campers there, and I’m also in partnership with a guy who owns a rental RV place.”
That partnership, according to Shook, involves a lot of other volunteer fire department volunteers or retired firefighters.
The RVs are often rented out for big events like Talladega, Bonnaroo and Rock the South, he said, but they are also rented to individuals or families who lose homes to a fire.
“We go set it up for them and everything, and they can live there until insurance figures out what to do with the house,” Shook said. “We all have the brotherhood and sisterhood in common, and I really like that.”
Mechanical work has interested Shook for his entire life.
As a child, he said he frequently “messed with” farm equipment and old trucks and cars. He also began welding when he was 13 years old, which is the same age his dad bought him his first truck — a project they worked on together.
That work followed Shook into the military, too.
Joining up was a “spur of the moment” decision, and he said that none of his immediate family had ever done anything like it.
“I just wanted to do something different,” he said.
Shook served in the Army National Guard from 1997 to 2006 as part of a signal unit out of Russellville. He even did a tour of Iraq from 2003 to 2006.
“We set up communications for whoever needed it,” he explained. “I just kept stuff rolling. We worked on generators and Humvees and trucks — stuff like that.”
Shook said he had post-traumatic stress disorder after returning from Iraq, but his experience with the military did shape his passion for serving others.
“[The military] made me more dedicated to wanting to help the community,” he said. “They taught us a bunch of basic life-saving stuff that piqued my interest … so I went and got my EMT basic certification.”
Shook worked for an ambulance service for 13 years before returning to his mechanical roots, but his desire to help others was still pressing.
It was through one of his four daughters that he became interested in volunteering as a firefighter.
“She sparked my own interest when she started volunteering with the fire departments,” Shook admitted.
The rest is history. Shook, who has been chief at Frog Pond for about a year, is working hard to rebuild a volunteer department that has suffered from some difficult circumstances.
Currently, he said his department covers approximately 500 homes with just 20 firefighters.
A decal honoring the lives lost during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks is seen on the window of Engine No.4 at the Frog Pond Volunteer Fire Department in Spruce Pine, Ala., on Wednesday, June 11, 2025. [DAN BUSEY/TIMESDAILY]
“Our engine was on Ground Zero at 9/11,” Shook said. “There was a dad and son pair on the truck — one was a veteran — and they both died that day.
“The names are still on the truck.”
Despite his busy work schedule, Shook still manages to keep his family in front and center.
Technically considered work trips, he said the whole family loads up in their RV to go to Talladega twice a year, and the vehicle stays parked on the lake from March to November so they can stay there to camp and fish whenever they want.
Having ample time to devote to his family is exactly why Shook started his own business. He credits his dad, who died June 6, 2023, with giving him the push to make the change.
“He was always working and didn’t get to spend a whole lot of time with family,” Shook explained. “Then, the good Lord had to slow him down in life, and he lost both of his legs. In the last three years of his life, if he wanted to do something, we just took off and did it with him.
“It was something important to him that he emphasized. He wanted me to be able to take time off and spend it with my wife and kids.”
As for Shook’s fervor for service, he does not imagine it will fade anytime soon.
“I just like returning what I can to the community and being able to help and provide,” he said. “I just try to give back by helping out.”
