This is a blog version of a Facebook posting from June 8, 2025.

For today’s rescue history, let’s take a trip to Stanly County (NC) . The date is October 15, 1965. On that Friday night at 10:26 p.m., a 1963 Chevy Impala lost control on the curve at Pee Dee Avenue and Tenth Street in Albemarle.

It struck a utility pole and then a concrete wall, trapping two people in the car. Two others were ejected, and one of whom died at the scene, reported the next week’s newspaper.

The Stanly County Rescue Squad responded, and it took 45 minutes to free a passenger in the back seat. Because this was long before George Hurst’s famous tool was being used by rescue services.

Cecil Smith was one of the squad members who worked the extrication. He kept thinking about the time it took to free the victim from the car. There had to be a better way, he thought.

Set to Work in His Basement

Smith was a city policeman in Albemarle and thus answered most of the car accidents that the squad responded to. As recounted in the Stanly News and Press on April 3, 2005, “he set to work in his basement” to build a solution. And it only about ten years to perfect.

The resulting invention was a device that could pull a car door, quarter panel, or steering wheel. It could also open two doors at once—either front or rear doors—using a chain-pulled hook on one door, and a pass-through beam on the other door.

Later, he added a lift, to raise the end of a car, tractor, or other heavy object. He also designed his device to be portable. It was easily broken down into component parts.

The rescue tool became known as Cecil’s Rig. It had no motors, nor hydraulics. And Smith himself used it at least twenty times to save lives. It was widely used across Stanley and surrounding counties. And in places as far away as Pennsylvania.

Perfecting the Device

In a profile of the rescue squad in the Stanly News and Press on May 19, 1978, Smith said that he spent ten years perfecting his device.

“In his shop at home he began shaping and fabricating pieces of metal” to match the idea in his head. The next couple years, he said, were “filled with trial and error, hit and miss, modifications and new approaches.” Along with many pieces of discarded metal, and a few of which were salvaged.

Though he tried calling his device the Rescue Pull and Lift Frame, the name Cecil’s Rig was what everyone else called it.

By May 1978, he was manufacturing units for sale through his company rigco, Inc., which he incorporated in March 1978. And he had two distributors to handle sales, one for the Carolinas and Virginia, and another in Pennsylvania to sell the rig in twelve northeastern states.

Then what happened?

More History

Here are some assorted newspaper citations that continue the story, and add to the backstory:

1972, Oct – Cecil’s Rig was used by Stanly Rescue Squad for the first time. It was added as a permanent piece of equipment. [Salisbury Post, 11/12/76]

1974, May 17 – Cecil Smith demonstrated his device at a Locust Lions Club meeting. He described Cecil’s Rig as “the biggest breakthrough in rescue work in 25 years.” By that time, the device was being manufactured by Westa, Inc., [2] a metal and machine shop in Locust. [SNP, 5/17/74]

[2] That company apparently ceased operating in August 1977, after the death of owner and manager Jack Sasser, 45, on August 26, 1977. The company’s equipment was liquidated at auction in February 1978. [Charlotte News, 8/27/77; SNP, 2/21/78]

1976, Nov 12 – Cecil Smith received a patent on his device, which “was technical known as a rescue pull and lift frame.” He applied for the patent on October 12, 1973, and received the patient exactly three years later. By that time, Smith was working as a lineman with the City of Albemarle’s electrical. Noted the newspaper story, there were six [other?] rescue squads in North Carolina using Cecil’s Rig, and one was recently used in Anson County to free the occupant of a small airplane. [Salisbury Post, 11/12/76]

1977, Sep 06 – Stanly County Rescue Squad shown using their Cecil’s Rig to “tear apart the mangled and upside-down vehicle” to free two victims in a fatal vehicle accident. [SNP, 9/6/77]

1979, Jan 13 – Iredell County Rescue Squad was planning a fundraiser in March, to raise money to purchase of a Cecil’s Rig for their North Iredell station. [Statesville Record & Landmark, 1/13/79]

1986, Dec 05 – Cecil Smith and Chuck Morehead, organizer of Stanly County Rescue Squad, gave a presentation about Cecil’s Rig to the Albemarle Optimist Club. [SNP, 12/5/86]

1990, Jul 08 – Two new (identical?) crash trucks were purchased in Iredell County, for Iredell RS and South Iredell RS. Each was equipped with a Cecil’s Rig, along with hydraulic extrication equipment. [Statesville Record and Landmark, 7/8/90]

1992, Jan 23 – Stanley Rescue Squad and Medstar members shown using a Cecil’s Rig to free an accident victim. [SNP, 1/23/92]