Role: Nun, Firefighter
Sister Mary-Joy Langdon is a nun who was the first woman to be an operational firefighter in Britain.
Langdon was born in 1951 in Battle, East Sussex, and attended Charters Towers School, Bexhill, East Sussex. In the summer of 1976 there was a major drought in Britain and the fire brigades needed extra people. Langdon volunteered and joined the Battle fire station, close to her family farm as part of the East Sussex Fire Brigade part-time but being on call for 24 hours. She had passed all the normal tests including carrying an 11 stone (150 lb; 70 kg) man for 100 yards. At the age 25, she was the UK’s first ever female firefighter to be formally admitted to a brigade. She joined on 21 August 1976 leaving in 1983.
