Dispatched to an unconfirmed shooting in 1990 without an exact address or directions, former EMS director Brent Sherrer and his partner relied on instinct to navigate Oglethorpe County’s rural backroads.
On a hunch, Sherrer pulled up to his grandmother’s house and looked through the front picture window. Inside, he saw her covered in blood after being shot twice in the heart.
Without a direct radio signal, Sherrer stabilized her injuries at the scene, called ahead for a trauma surgeon and rushed her to the hospital. She survived and lived another 10 years.
"I had to work on my grandmother, which I shouldn't have had to do. ... If I hadn't gone down the road on a hunch, my grandmother would have been dead. I said, 'We're gonna have 911 in this county,’” Sherrer said.
Following the call, Sherrer pushed county commissioners to establish a 911 system and address rural roads.
“It took several years to convince the commissioners, but that call was the reason," he said.
Sherrer’s story was one of many shared last Friday as former directors, retired paramedics, current crew members and families gathered at the Platt-Brooks Estate to mark 50 years of Oglethorpe County EMS.
The event celebrated the evolution of the agency from a single truck in 1976 to modern 24-hour pre-hospital care.
"The culture of us in EMS hasn't changed a lot," current EMS director Josh Robinson said. "The talk around the table continued — it’s just like they picked up where they left off."
When Oglethorpe County established a paid service under its first director (Bob McKinley) in 1976, crew members operated with minimal supplies: one ambulance, two responders per shift and basic equipment.
James Mathews, who took the county’s first volunteer EMT class as a high school senior in 1973 and served as director from 2002-11, said early crews had to deal with few resources.
"I remember when we first got on the ambulance, we had an oxygen tank, but we didn't have delivery devices. No nasal cannulas, no face masks. We just had the tank,” Mathews said.
Early crews navigated the county’s 440 square miles without digital dispatch or physical house numbers. Calls came through shared phone lines, requiring dispatchers to give directions using local markers.
"They would say, 'You know where so and so lives? You go down this road till you get to the big rock and take a left at the oak tree down there,'" Sherrer said.
Without modern navigation, learning those rural routes fell to the crews.
“GPS was non-existent in their time," Robinson said. "Part of coming on shift was handing over the map books and studying where you were going."
Mathews succeeded Sherrer as director in 2002 after his medical retirement, serving until 2011, alongside his 32-year tenure as county coroner.
"It was never about money to me," Mathews said. "It was about being there and holding somebody's hand, showing them that we're here for you."
Following Mathews' retirement in 2011, leadership passed to Wendy Ryan before Jason Lewis took over and introduced the department's first Quick Response Vehicle (QRV).
Under Robinson, who took over in April 2025 after Lewis became county administrator, Oglethorpe County EMS runs two 24-hour ambulance crews and a 24-hour QRV. The agency also joined a select group of rural Georgia departments carrying pre-hospital whole blood on trucks.
Fifty years after Oglethorpe County established its paid department, Georgia officially declared ambulance services an essential service under state law on July 1, 2026.
"They did a lot back then and we're doing more now," Robinson said.