Firefighter Appreciation sections prompts thank you letter

MARYSVILLE Waist-deep in cold black water 40 feet down a well, Angie Nicholson knew her chances were grim at best.
Yelling would get her nowhere since the well was out away from the farm house. She had tried climbing the pump line, digging her shoes into the stony walls of the well for leverage. But she kept slipping. The water was so cold, she hadnt realized that when she fell into the well two hours prior, she had fractured her arm.
Though her accident occurred in 1975, some of the details remain clear as glass. More of them surfaced after reading The Marysville Globe and Arlington Times Firefighter Appreciation section in early October in which firefighters gave accounts of their most dangerous and happy-ending situations.
Her situation began on a cool afternoon in September when shed gone out to the well house to turn on the pump to channel water to the cow troughs. As she waited for the water to fill the troughs, she went berry picking. When she returned to turn off the pump, she stepped on one of the rickety boards covering the mouth of the well, something the family knew about but just hadnt gotten around to fixing. The board snapped and Nicholson came crashing down into the water. The pump remained secured to the surface platform.
In the Firefighter Appreciation section, Marysville Fire Chief Greg Corn recounted the moment the department got a call that a woman had fallen into a well. Nicholsons husband, Lloyd, had come home from work surprised that Nicholson was nowhere around. His daughter, Carla, who with her cousin had been in the house leafing through her cousins wedding album, told him, Mom went out berry picking. As the sunlight faded, he went out over the rugged pasture to the well house where he saw the door ajar and floorboards missing.
Looking up, the quarter-sized circle of dim light atop the well suddenly flickered, and Nicholson knew she would be spared. Her husband, looking down the shaft of the well was surprised and relieved she was alive and after reassuring her, ran back to the house and told his daughter to call 911. Carla was frozen.
I couldnt even dial the number, she remembered 32 years later, standing on the very pasture near the well, which has since been sealed over with concrete.
When Corn, then a rookie with the department, and the other firefighters arrived at the Lakewood farm, it was Corn who went down the well after Nicholson. They both fell under water as he hooked her up to makeshift rigging system.
I had to go underwater and I never touched bottom, he recalled.
After securing her, he roped himself in, too, and the crew above slowly hauled them up. It was a moment several people wouldnt forget. Nicholson, in response to Corns account wrote a letter to the editor of the Marysville Globe:
Id like people to know that Im still alive and well (excuse the pun) Im the one Greg Corn helped out of the well 32 years ago, and Id like to thank him again for coming down after me.
Nicholsons other daughter, Carol Beecher, saw the Firefighter Appreciation article first and brought it to her mothers attention. The following Sunday at the Marysville Christian Church at Fourth Street, Beecher stood before the congregation, pointed to the article and gave tearful thanks that her mother was alive and doing fine.
Its emotional, Beecher said from her desk at the County Assessors office as the memory of the moment flooded over her. Regaining her composure, she added, I didnt realize how far she had fallen. Sometimes it takes getting older to realize what a close call that was. I dont know if I realized it back then.
The day after the accident, Nicholsons husband properly boarded up the well. Nicholson tried her best to continue her life as she had always lived it: Taking care of her five children and minding the house and the animals. As the children grew and grandchildren came along, Nicholson took a front-desk job at Bayliner where she worked for eight years. She also worked several years at an area nursing home.
Now at a vibrant 77, Nicholson lives in a small cottage a stones throw from the well, next door to the farm house where her daughter, Carla Kneeland, now lives. Nicholsons husband, Lloyd, died 10 years ago, and now she spends most of her time helping people. She goes to the Senior Center at Smokey Point every Friday to prepare snacks for more than 130 people. She also looks after her son-in-law, Charlie Richards, who is recouping from a serious heart condition.
Youre going to have to go a long ways to find anyone better, Richards said of Nicholson.
Nicholson now has nine grandchildren and seven great grandchildren. But she never tells the well story to them, for fear of worrying them and wanting to close that chapter in her life. Time has flown, she said.