She beamed as she made her way across the sandwich shop to where Aurora Fire Rescue Lt. Kathleen Hancock was standing.

“Sorry to interrupt,” the Black woman said, but she wanted to introduce herself to Hancock, Aurora’s first Black female firefighter who was just promoted to lieutenant.

“I kind of got emotional,” Terri House said. “She is a beacon. I feel really excited to just see a female Black firefighter. I feel pride. I feel a piece of me is represented.”

House is a program manager for the Latino Coalition and invited Hancock to speak to an empowerment group for young girls. The firefighter, who traded her track and field jackets and medals in high school and college for her fire uniform, is used to people stopping her in public. (Hancock was a two-time Colorado 3A state champion in the 400 meter in 1986-87, and she was inducted into Greater Pueblo Sports Association Hall of Fame.)

But now it’s because she’s among only a few Black female firefighters in the region, the highest-ranking in Aurora’s history.

Of the agency’s 446 firefighters, 18 are Black. Thirty-one of the firefighters are women and only three of them are Black women.

In the city lauded as the state’s most diverse where white residents make up a smaller percentage than people of color, the agency’s demographics are not representative of the population. In 2021, nearly 17% of Aurora residents identified as only Black or African American with almost 11% as two or more races, according to 2021 U.S. Census data. About 50% identified as female.

The lack of diversity within fire departments is not unique to Aurora. A Columbia Southern University report cited 2019 data that show 95.8% of firefighters nationwide identify as male and almost 80% as white (non-Hispanic).

At the Denver Fire Department, of 1,085 sworn employees, 33 are Black men and one is a Black female. The department also employs 508 white men and 27 white women; eight American Indian or Alaska Native men; 13 Asian men; 18 men who identified as other or multiracial; and 296 men and 50 women undetermined, according to department data.

“The goal for Denver Fire is to have our community look at us and see themselves,” Capt. JD Chism said. “We want to make sure that we’re representing our community wherever we go.”

But, like other industries, fire agencies are struggling with recruitment generally, particularly after COVID hit. Chism said when was first hired 16 years ago, 1,000 slots could be filled for a test in 10 minutes. The latest test had 300 slots and it took a couple of weeks to fill.

Since Hancock was hired 11 years ago in Aurora, the agency has added on two more Black women firefighters — Danielle Allen and Brooke Simms. The three of them have been working to find ways to show other women and people of color that the fire service is a viable career path they should consider.

The fire rescue’s efforts include targeted recruitment, focusing on more face-to-face contact with underrepresented groups in an attempt to dispel some of the historical distrust of government and encourage more people to apply, said Deputy Chief Allen Robnett.

Robnett hopes that the impact on young Black women who see Hancock, Allen and Simms could go even beyond the fire service.

“These are three firefighters that have a tremendous amount of knowledge and skill and professionalism. … There’s a phrase, ‘somehow you have to see it before you can believe it.’ And so when young Black girls are looking at a career, if they don’t see anybody doing that function, they often don’t believe that they can either. And so having that image showing these powerful women doing this, in this traditionally male-dominated field, is tremendous,” he said.

That’s why Hancock takes that representation so seriously, both as a woman and as a Black person, despite neither being the reason she joined. At one point last year, when she and Allen were sitting in the front seat of a fire truck together and saw people watching them, Hancock told Allen, “you know, there’s history being made today.”

Hancock comes from a background in history-making. Her dad Eddie Lee Hancock of Pueblo was a Negro League baseball player who pitched for the New Orleans Eagles and played with the Memphis Red Sox and Pueblo Dodgers.

Now, she has a black and white picture hanging in a hallway in her house of her dad sitting on a bench next to his teammates in Memphis. It’s signed by Charley Pride, the singer who played with her dad before he became famous for his music.

Growing up in Pueblo, Hancock was often one of only a few Black people in school and other places. It was the same when she got her first job as a firefighter in Tucson, Arizona — she joined the fire department as the second Black female firefighter to work there and the only one at the time.

Hancock had previously worked as an athletic trainer and physical therapist, but after the unexpected death of her mom, she started making changes in her life. That process also led her back to Colorado in 2012 when she was hired by Aurora Fire Rescue.

Up until graduating from the academy, Hancock said she had no idea she would be Aurora’s only Black female firefighter. It wasn’t until people starting shaking her hand, telling her they were all waiting to see if she would succeed.

“I’m glad I did not know because for me, it would have been a lot of pressure,” she said. “Because I already had pressure I placed on me to be the best that I could be.”

Hancock was encouraged by seeing other women working at the Aurora fire department, including in higher ranks — something she aspired to do. And her potential “token” status didn’t faze her. She said she’s always adapted and is always willing to teach and have conversations with people, no matter who they are.

In her time at Aurora Fire Rescue, Hancock paved the way for other women, including Black women, to work at the department — for which Allen and Simms say they’re grateful.

“I’m super thankful to have Kat and the experience with her coming from Tucson and coming here to already have this perspective but also this strong foundation,” Simms said. “Like what it means to come into this field, this career, because it’s different to be a woman. It’s different to be a Black person. And then it’s different to be a Black woman.”

It’s not only about how the job works though. Simms, 32, laughs as she recalls that after she graduated from the academy in 2019, she wasn’t sure what to do with her hair — long, thick and curly — so that it could fit under her helmet. She ended up cutting it herself. Working with other people who understand the significance of such choices can make a difference. Now, she tries on her helmet before every shift and adjusts depending on her hair.

All three women talked about the importance of learning and communicating openly, especially in a city like Aurora where many of its residents are immigrants and refugees.

Allen, 28, speaks multiple languages, including Spanish and Arabic. The Princeton graduate was hired in 2018 and has recently been working to develop a language app to help firefighters communicate with people in Spanish. She’s also created a webinar series to teach non-native English speakers in Aurora how to communicate with first responders in English. And she often leads mini “history lessons” with other crew members about various populations of residents.

“You have 160 languages spoken (in Aurora),” she said. “You have massive refugee populations from all over the world. And to not know their stories is to do them a disservice when you’re helping them because you don’t actually know how they got to this place, whether it’s this place being Aurora or this place being the medical call you’re going on.”

Understanding those cultural and religious nuances to help the residents they serve may come easier to people who have been in similar situations of being the “only other,” Simms said — another reason to diversify the profession.

A variety of theories exist about why it’s been difficult to recruit people of color to work in the fire service, part of which Allen thinks is likely due to people not truly understanding what firefighters do. They’re not always just running into fires. A majority of their calls are medical. The crew members say they truly feel like a family working together.

There are other challenges, too, when it comes to hiring women. The fire service has been a traditionally male profession and the job is considered blue-collar and physical, said Ronda Scholting, spokesperson for West Metro Fire Rescue, headquartered in Lakewood. Sixteen of its 409 firefighters are women.

“It’s a profession where you get your hands dirty, with long hours and sometimes little sleep,” Scholting said. “As a society, we have not had a track record of encouraging young women to seek out occupations with those types of working conditions and physical requirements.”

One way Colorado departments have tried to change that is by hosting youth summer camps — West Metro helps lead Camp Ember for girls ages 16-18 to learn firefighting skills, taught by women in the field; and Aurora Fire has Camp Spark for girls ages 12-18, started by Hancock and other women.

At South Metro Fire Rescue, which serves Arapahoe, Douglas and Jefferson counties, 37 of its 631 firefighters are women, one of whom is Black. The first Black woman was hired in 2000, according to department data. The agency is working with nonprofits, military bases, sports organizations and various social and cultural groups to reach a more diverse applicant pool, according to spokesperson Lauren Ono. West Metro is studying barriers to access as well as making changes such as increasing maternity and adoption leave policies.

It’s almost a chicken-and-egg dilemma. To get more diverse candidates, they need to see more people who are similar to them working in those fields.

The challenge is one Hancock has accepted.

After she came home from a dinner out with friends last week, she saw her red helmet sitting at her kitchen table. The red helmets are for lieutenants and captains of the agency, a symbol of Hancock’s promotion.

She called her brother and sister-in-law, barely able to speak as she choked back tears.

“So it finally hit you?” her sister-in-law asked.

“I did it,” Hancock said.

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