On Mar. 7, 1970, Medic One went into operation in King County, Washington as an on-the-scene, emergency response system for heart attacks and other medical crises. Dr. Leonard A. Cobb, a Cardiologist at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, working with Gordon Vickery, Chief of the Seattle Fire Department, used a converted R/V chassis based at Harborview, and affectionately called it the ‘Moby Pig.’

It was decided that the most appropriate agency for this task was the Seattle Fire Department, an organization already dedicated to rapid response in emergency situations.  Gordon F. Vickery, then Chief of the Fire Department, was already in the process of improving first-aid training for the firefighters and procuring more efficient aid vehicles.

Shortly after its inception, Medic One began to produce positive results; patients who were clinically dead on the paramedics’ arrival were successfully resuscitated at the scene, hospitalized, and eventually released to return to normal lives. Countless other patients were stabilized at the scene with intravenous drug therapy and other advanced procedures, and in many cases, owed their lives to this special care.

The physicians, many of whom had wartime medical experience, recognized that motivated people with a basic education could be trained to perform sophisticated, physician-level medical procedures with proficiency.  Chief Vickery recognized that this advanced emergency medical service was a logical extension of services his Department already provided.  Thus, from this amalgamation of interests, Seattle Medic One was born.

In late 1969, the first class of 15 Seattle Fire Department personnel began a training course, designed specifically to provide pre-hospital treatment of patients with cardiac complaints.  The students learned the essentials of coronary care, including twelve lead EKG interpretation, rhythm recognition, drug therapy, intracardiac injection, IV placement, endotracheal intubation, defibrillator use, and patient monitoring.  The course included 200 hours of classroom instruction, and about 700 hours of internship in the Harborview Medical Center operating room and emergency room supervised by the physicians in those arenas.