Emergency!

Set at the fictional Fire Station 51 of the Los Angeles County Fire Department, where one fire engine and the paramedic rescue squad are stationed, the series focuses on two young firefighter-paramedics: young and immature John Roderick "Johnny" Gage (Randolph Mantooth), who is always unlucky in love, and more mature family man Roy DeSoto (Kevin Tighe), who crew the rescue squad, Squad 51, and, in addition to providing emergency medical care, perform technical rescues such as vehicle extrication.


The paramedics are supervised by the Emergency Room (ER) staff of Rampart General Hospital: head physician Dr. Kelly Brackett (Robert Fuller), head nurse Dixie McCall (Julie London), neurosurgeon Dr. Joe Early (played by London's real-life husband Bobby Troup), and young intern Dr. Michael "Mike" Morton (Ron Pinkard, though in the early episodes was a character named Dr. Thomas Gray).


Other regular characters are the firefighters of Station 51's "A" shift, Chester B. "Chet" Kelly (played by Tim Donnelly) and Marco Lopez (played by actor Marco Lopez). Mike Stoker, a Los Angeles County Fire Department firefighter, drove the fire engine.^[5] Los Angeles County Fire Department Dispatcher Samuel Lanier portrayed himself in an uncredited voice role (over the radio) throughout the series, and he is also occasionally shown in a brief clip at the dispatch office just before a dispatch is heard in later seasons; he retired from the department shortly after Emergency! finished.^[6] Lopez speaks Spanish, and occasionally translated for the crew when a victim or onlooker spoke Spanish but no English. Unusually, Lopez, Stoker and Dick Hammer play characters named after themselves, though in two episodes, Hammer's character is played by John Smith.


Various characters held the rank of Captain throughout the series. These include Captain Dick Hammer (Los Angeles County Fire Department Captain Richard Hammer as himself for first season/episodes 1–9, then later John Smith for the last two episodes of the season), Captain Hank Stanley (Michael Norell, during the remaining seasons) and Captain Gene "Captain Hook" Hookrader in a couple of later episodes. Actor John Anderson portrayed Captain Bob Roberts in one Season 4 episode, "Smoke Eater".


Other recurring characters include Battalion Chiefs Conrad (Art Balinger), Sorensen (Art Gilmore), Miller, and McConnike (William Boyett), Firefighter Conway / Firefighter Paramedic Tom Wheeler / Animal Control Supervisor Walt Marsh (Gary Crosby), Los Angeles County Sheriff's Deputy/Carson Police Officer/Sergeant Vince (Vince Howard), and recurring ambulance attendants Albert "Al" (Angelo DeMeo) and his assistant, George (George Orrison). Boyett and Crosby regularly appeared as Sergeant MacDonald and Officer Ed Wells respectively on Adam-12, while Gilmore appeared on that show as watch commander Lieutenant Moore, a recurring character.


The role of Dixie McCall was originally written as a love interest for Fuller's character, Dr. Kelly Brackett, though the on-screen romance between Brackett and McCall was gradually downplayed and eventually ignored over the course of the series; this was explained by Brackett's and McCall's romance not having worked out.

Development[edit]

The series was created by Robert Cinader and Jack Webb.^[2][7] Webb had previously created Dragnet, and with Cinader had jointly created Adam-12, both of which were TV series about policing. In 1971, Cinader and Webb met with Captain Jim Page and other officers from the Los Angeles County Fire Department to discuss creating a show about firefighters. Initially they planned to focus the show on physical rescues, but felt that there would not be enough ideas for episodes. Page suggested they look to the Los Angeles County Fire Department's new paramedic program for ideas.^[2]


At the time, the Los Angeles area was home to 2 of only 12 paramedic programs in the United States (as opposed to ambulances that provided basic first aid or only transport). In 1970, Governor Ronald Reagan had signed the Wedworth-Townsend Act which allowed paramedic programs to be trialed in Los Angeles County.^[2] In September 1971, Cinader and Webb signed a contract with NBC to develop the series.^[2] The initial pilot film of Emergency!, titled "The Wedsworth-Townsend Act", focuses on the passage of a similar law to the Wedworth-Townsend Act that permits paramedics to operate.^[8]


Cinader asked the writers to get all the rescues that were to be portrayed on the show from fire stations' logbooks.^[9] Along the same line, the series was technically accurate as every script was fact-checked and approved by the series' technical consultants, Dr. Michael Criley (the man who had initially created the Los Angeles County Fire Department Paramedic program) and Los Angeles County Fire Department Battalion Chief James O. Page. There were always real paramedics serving as technical advisors on set every day for further technical advice.^[9]


To train for their parts, the actors, Mantooth and Tighe sat in some paramedic classes (although they never actually took any written exams) and went on extensive ride-alongs with Los Angeles County Fire Department.^[9] In an interview with Tom Blixa of WTVN, Mantooth said that the producer wanted them to train so that they would at least know the fundamentals and look like they knew what they were doing on camera. Mantooth mentioned that you needed to take the entire course and pass all the skills stations and final certification exam to be a paramedic, and went on to admit that "if anyone has a heart attack, I'll call 911 with the best of them."^[10] Mantooth became an advocate for firefighters and paramedics after the series ended. He continued, as of late October 2014, to give speeches and make appearances all over the country at special events.^[11]