Today we honor Earl Hillbish with the Friendship Hose Co.#1 whose LODD was 6/2/1959. On June 2, 1959, a tanker truck filled with 7,000 gallons of propane was involved in a motor vehicle collision outside the Pennsylvania town of Orwigsburg that resulted in the death of Orwigsburg Fireman Earl Hillbish and nine other persons, and injuries to twelve other bystanders. The damaged tanker truck had been struck in the rear by a tractor trailer that skidded on a rain slick roadway in the Red Church area of the Schuylkill County community.