All creative people fascinate me, but creative young people inspire me with hope for the future. Over the past couple months, I’ve met some interesting young people who’ve generated great ideas by following their passions. One is Sun Lakes (Ariz.) Firefighter David DeGraaf, the creator of the Firehouse Scheduler, a shift-scheduling app for smartphones. DeGraaf told me the project started by him entering his own shift schedule on his phone. Soon fellow firefighters were asking him to enter their schedules in their phones. “Each one was different and would require manual entry,” DeGraaf said, so he talked his cousin into teaching him how to write a basic software program. “The program requires the pattern and then repeats itself.” As queries increased, DeGraaf created LeakyNozzle.com to sell his app. The app currently is only available for the Android phone, but will be available for the iPhone by the end of August. DeGraaf found police officers and dispatchers are also using his app to load their shift schedules. FDNY’s shift calendar is unique, so he created an exclusive app for FDNY. Another inspiring young firefighter is Austin Weishel. While in high school, Weishel started both sculpting and volunteer firefighter in Loveland, Colo. Now 21, Weishel is a volunteer for Windsor-Severance, Colo., and a bronze sculpture artist who recently completed a life-sized piece for the department’s new fire museum. The department had been scheduled to open the fire museum two years ago, but building was destroyed by a devastating tornado. The rebuilt museum’s opening ceremony featured the unveiling of Weishel’s sculpture. Paid for by private donations, “ Follow Your Heart ” depicts a firefighter kneeling and talking to a young boy. The models were a firefighter and his young son. Creative people can get ideas from anywhere, even the back end of a car. Have you seen the decals or firefighter license plates in some states and assumed the driver was a firefighter? Well, Columbia (S.C.) Police Officer Kristian Bell thought the same thing about the decals with a blue bar (for police) and red bar (for firefighters) that people put on their vehicles. When he found out that anyone could buy the decals, Bell decided to create a decal, “Watch My 6 ,” that would only be sold after verifying the status of the police or firefighter. “The decal is a shield, with the number ‘6’ in the center and ‘Watch My’ written within the 6. This represents ‘watch my back’ using the clock system,” Bell said. “My goal with this design is promote brotherhood.” With 10 years on the police force, Bell believes the restricted decal represents the pride, struggles, and commitment that these community heroes endure. “My decals are only sold to the people who have earned them,” he said. “This insures that the firefighters and police officers can display them with pride knowing that they are limited.” Do you know some creative people we should write about?
Originally posted here:
People You Should Know
