Brandon Prophet credits the Petes for instilling the importance of the community
One of the central themes of Brandon Prophet’s life is community involvement and that is something he learned during his time in junior hockey and was able to carry on to his job as a firefighter.
Prophet was traded to the Petes from the Barrie Colts in 2016 and in his second year with the Petes, he was named Captain and led the Petes to the conference finals against the Mississauga Steelheads.
One thing Prophet really enjoyed and learned from in his time in the OHL is the importance of community involvement. This first began when he was 16 years old and starting out his OHL journey with the Saginaw Spirit. He and the team had the opportunity to work with The United Way and build wheelchair-accessible ramps.
“I remember the sense of fulfillment I got out of having a very small part of that and being able to be there,” said Prophet. “I guess it kind of transitioned from there throughout the five years of my time in the OHL wanting to always be involved in the community.”
During his time in Peterborough, the Petes staff–which consisted of Mike Oke, Jody Hull, and Jake Grimes– instilled the importance of community involvement in the team. Prophet and the Petes worked with several different organizations such as Bell Let’s Talk, the Canadian Mental Health Association, and Crime Stoppers. He also had the opportunity to go around to different schools and put on puppet shows for the kids on topics such as inclusion and bullying prevention and be a celebrity server at Kelsey’s and East Side Mario’s.
“We were always doing something,” mentioned Prophet. “It was very important, we worked alongside Matt D’Agostini and he did a really good job stressing to us how important it was to be not only be involved and focus on our on-ice initiatives but also our off-ice stuff as well.” This is something that he was able to take to his current job as a firefighter in his hometown of Brockville.
Following his time with the Petes, Prophet attended Queen’s University for one year where he played hockey while he was studying Psychology. However, firefighting had always been one of Prophet’s dream jobs, so he made the decision to leave Queen’s to study Pre-Service Firefighting at St Lawrence College.
Before becoming a firefighter, Prophet briefly served as a police officer with the OPP in Renfrew following in his father Rob’s footsteps, who was a police officer for the Prescott Police and the OPP. He thoroughly enjoyed policing but still wanted to do firefighting as he felt it gave him even more of an opportunity to be involved in his community and the chance to move back to Brockville.
“Certainly, it’s a very rewarding career and both of them were I love both of them and at the end of the day if I was fortunate enough to do both I certainly would,” said Prophet.
A few ways Prophet has been involved in his community through firefighting include giving children tours of the station and going around to schools to teach children about fire safety. On Halloween night, kids stop by the fire station to go trick or treating. Other events include the Fire Truck Pull, which raises funds for the YMCA and attending the Brockville Pride Parade where the firefighters got the opportunity to dress up not only themselves but also their trucks.
In October 2022, Prophet married his wife, Kendall, who he first met when he attended high school in Brockville, and in December 2022 they bought their first house together in Brockville.