It’s Been 30 Years Since Powell Firefighter, Son Electrocuted During Crash Rescue

A bronze sculpture named “The Volunteer” stands in the Powell Fire Department Station on South Street.

It’s more than art. It’s a monument to a man’s legacy, stirring up emotions 30 years after the tragic events triggered its creation.

The larger-than-life bronze features a tall firefighter in turnout gear, holding a hose and keeping a protective left hand out as if to keep back a young man at his side from danger.

“That was my first monument-size sculpture that I ever did. I’d been a sculptor doing small stuff,” said James Marsico, 74, the Powell artist who created it.

He paused to collect himself as memories came back. 

“I had a hard time.”

It wasn’t hard because of the scale of the work. Marsico struggled because the clay he formed into the tall, strong protector was no figure from history, but from his heart.

He was a friend, a colleague on the fire department, and a leader who gave his life trying to save his son.

Bruce Honstain’s pager tones erupted on Sept. 10, 1996, around 7 p.m. as he was doing maintenance on a vending machine at a popular Powell restaurant.

The 43-year-old father of two served as the assistant fire chief for the Powell Fire Department. He ran his own company that offered jukeboxes, vending machines, pool tables and other entertainment items for other businesses.

Former Powell Fire Chief Jim Jarrett had recently retired but stayed in close communication with the firefighters and still carried his pager. He had recruited Honstain years earlier. 

“I had just got home from a trip and heard the fire call come across the scanner,” he said. “I could tell by the radio traffic that there had been an accident and that a major power line had hit the ground.”

Honstain arrived at the scene along with the department’s new fire chief. Jarrett said he spoke with the chief, who is now deceased, after the incident about what happened.

The Accident

What is known is that Jarrett’s 17-year-old son, Joshua, was a passenger in a 1982 Toyota Supra that just before 7 p.m. on that Tuesday night left Lane 9 1/2 Road east of Powell and took out a power pole carrying 7,200-volt feeder lines for the City of Powell’s electrical needs.

Honstain apparently recognized the car as one that belonged to another 17-year-old who was a close friend of his son. In addition to the driver, another 17-year-old boy was in the car.

Joshua Honstain had just started his senior year of high school. He was a member of the Powell Panthers high school swim team and claimed the Wyoming state championship breaststroke medal as a sophomore. He also was a reigning state champion as part of the school’s 200 medley relay team.

Jarrett said the information he recalls through the former chief was that Joshua’s friend had picked him up at the Honstain home and they were headed down the county road when the driver accelerated and lost control of the car.

A Wyoming Highway Patrol officer told The Billings Gazette for its Sept. 18, 1996, edition that the sun was probably in the driver’s eyes and that driver inattention probably caused the wreck.

None of the three teens in the vehicle wore seatbelts. When the car hit the pole, the vehicle rotated clockwise and rolled into a ditch. The driver was thrown from the vehicle and came in contact with the downed lines, the Gazette reported.

The newspaper’s report stated that Joshua Honstain and the other teen escaped the vehicle, but Joshua returned apparently to help the driver and was electrocuted.

Jarrett said his understanding is that at least one power line was laying across the car, which was in a seven- or eight-foot ditch.

“I was told that Bruce immediately went down to the car to check on his son and he came in contact with that line and went down,” he said. 

Jarrett said when the local ambulance crew arrived, a female EMT also came in contact with line and was seriously injured.

Called To Department

Jarrett said as he listened to the radio traffic, he received a call from the fire department and was asked to go to the fire station. When he arrived, he understood that both Bruce and his son were being sent to Powell Hospital.

He arrived at the hospital and found Honstain’s wife and a couple of other close friends in the waiting room. In that room, the attending physician came in and informed them that both the father and son had died in the incident.

“It was an extremely hard blow for the department,” Jarrett said. “Bruce was a very popular guy, well known among the community. He was very, very fit, a strong guy, and just did a lot of good things.”

Joshua’s friend, the driver, survived his contact with the wire. The other passenger was treated and released. 

Honstain left behind his wife and daughter; Joshua left a sister and mother.

Funeral services for both Honstains were held at the school. The community and fire departments from across the state and Billings participated in the funeral. 

A parade of fire equipment went through the city.

Jarrett recalled that a bagpiper played at the funeral.

The fire department retired Honstain’s call sign “Fire 11.”

Firefighters wanted to honor the legacy of Honstain. That’s when someone came up with the idea of a sculpture. 

Marsico was asked if he would do it.

“I said, ‘Heck yeah,” Marsico recalled. 

Funds Raised

Funds were raised and Marsico created some maquettes of what he visualized, and then the larger sculpture. He donated his effort. 

The funds raised paid for the bronze casting process at a foundry. 

Marsico said he used his own son as the model for Joshua, though he was a few years younger, and he had a fireman from Lovell be the model for Bruce.

“Bruce was a big guy, a really tall person,” he said. “I sculpted it here in my studio."

The fire department installed the monument at the station. Jarrett said when he later joined the Park County Fire District Board he lobbied for a new station for the department to better meet the needs and demands in the community.

That structure, now at 1101 South Street in Powell, included design for the bronze statue out front, just as it had at the old station. A special permanent base was created and it is lit for travelers to see as they pass by at night.

“The Volunteer” is always on duty.

Marsico and Jarrett both agree their friend and colleague was well-trained and knew the dangers of a downed power line as he tried to rescue and save his son. For those who know the story in Powell, Sept. 10, 1996, has taken on relevance and memories similar to Sept. 11, 2001.

“It’s part of our legacy,” Jarrett said. “He was basically a local hero who found himself in a hard to imagine, untenable situation where he put his position as a father ahead of his position as a volunteer. 

"People should have a lot of empathy for that very rare and strange situation and hope that nobody would ever be put through that in a small community like this.”

Contact Dale Killingbeck at dale@cowboystatedaily.com

Dale Killingbeck can be reached at dale@cowboystatedaily.com.