EVANS CITY — A Forward Township native and U.S. Army specialist who recently returned from the Middle East got a surprise Wednesday night when family, friends and members of the Evans City Volunteer Fire Department celebrated his homecoming in patriotic fashion.

---- SPC. Tom Matoka, 24, and his wife, Haley, have lived in Fort Stewart, Ga., since he enlisted in 2013. The pair got married shortly after graduating from high school, and Matoka enlisted soon afterward.

---- It was a decision that would take him away from the fire company he joined as a teenager, and take both he and his wife away from the community they had lived in their entire lives.

---- On Wednesday Matoka's homecoming didn't go unnoticed. In fact, members of the fire company had been planning a surprise for Matoka for a while. They sent out invitations to participate in a motorcycle escort, and fired up the station's newest fire engine to serve as his ride into town.

---- Matoka's friends at the department said they organized the celebration to honor probably the company's first ever active member to leave on a military deployment. The department has one member, Jimmy Natali, in basic training, and another member, Rick Wilbert, who is a reservist in the U.S. military.

---- Matoka, who fellow firefighters say always has a way of saying what he thought and making people laugh at the same time, remains on the department's roster as an “on leave” firefighter because of his military service.