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 LIFE in the early days of the Houston Fire Department was far different than it is today. Things have changed dramatically since the fire department went fully paid in 1895. A glimpse into the past reveals how much the life of a firefighter has changed from the days when horses powered the old steamers, hose wagons, and ladder trucks. Appointment To begin with, a candidate for the fire department was chosen by the fire chief. There were no applications to fill out, nor written tests. No physicals nor background checks. One met with the fire chief and, if the chief liked the man and felt he could do the job, he was appointed as a supernumerary, or extra man. The only requirement of the fire department was that a candidate had to be between 21 and 35 years of age. (One reference said an applicant had to be capable of serving in the United States Army.) Every supernumerary was Caucasian. Minorities did not even apply. The only diversity in the fire department at the time were the animals. Both stallions and mares were chosen for fire horses. A supernumerary was sent directly to a fire station. There was no training. He picked up the skills watching the work of the regular firefighters. Horses, on the other hand, received extensive training. It took many hours in a training stall to get a horse used to the sounds of gongs and registers, repeated trots to a position in front of an apparatus, and the feel of a dropping harness and the quick hitch. Training was repeated many times with much praise and rewards from the trainer, until a horse became part of the team. The salary of supernumeraries are in question. The first listing of a pay scale was not until 1907, seven years after the fire department went fully paid. Supernumeraries were paid $60 a month, the same as a regular pipeman. This sounds unreasonable and may be incorrect. Extra men in other fire departments at the time were not paid until they temporarily took the place of a regular firefighter who took off from work. Some departments required the absent firefighter to reimbursed the extra man out of his salary. As late as the 1930s, extra men in Houston were only paid when they were called in to work. So, it is probable that the supernumeraries did not receive a salary. Uniforms and firefighting gear were provided by the men. Boots, slicker, and helmet cost $17. They could be bought on credit. Paychecks were held back when a firefighter got behind on the payments. One of the early firefighters made a twenty-seven-cent payment to get his paycheck. Cost of dress uniforms is unknown. The first evidence of the city furnishing gear was in the 1930s when the fire department issued helmets, which would fail every test required of helmets today. The helmet was made of a composite material, mainly cardboard, with layers of shellac and paint to stiffen the crown a bit. A small extension was riveted to the rear brim to shed falling water and embers. Coats and bunkers issued by the department came about much later, and work uniforms not until the latter 1950s. The fire department treated a trained horse much differently. Horses were furnished everything: daily meals, groomings, special protection at a fire, someone to clean up after them, and even complete health care throughout their tenure. Work Schedule Firefighters worked 15 days straight, day and night, followed by one 24-hour off day. A firefighter also had an hour off three times a day for meals. There were no sick leave or injury leave, and no vacations. Firefighters did organize a relief fund in 1898 to help those who were injured or sick. Dues of the members provided $5 per week after the first week of sickness or disability, and $75 for funeral expenses. Supernumeraries took the place of a regular firefighter who was away from the fire house for meals, on his day off, or other absence. Exactly how supernumeraries worked is unknown. Did a supernumerary work only when he was taking the place of a firefighter? Since he was assigned to a fire house to learn the job, surely he at least worked along with the firefighters at a fire house. The fire chief could terminate a supernumerary at the drop of a hat. There was no appeal. Regular firefighters could also be terminated and suspended by the fire chief. There was no civil service, no union. A terminated firefighter was gone. Period. The firefighters organized a union affiliated with the American Federation of Labor in 1902, but it was short-lived. A new fire chief let it be known that he looked unfavorably on labor unions, and the firefighters stopped going to the meetings. Lacking a quorum at the meetings, the union soon folded. After the commission form of government was approved by the voters in 1904, a firefighter could appeal a suspension or termination to the fire commissioner. Fire House
A majority of the fire houses in the fire department were narrow, two-story structures and smelled of a barn. There were one or two apparatus on the floor and a pair of horses in a nearby stall for each rig. An unenclosed watch office with a huge brass gong overhead hugged a side wall. Located upstairs was the dormitory. Sliding poles breached the floor for a rapid descent in case of a fire. Numbers 2, 7, and 9 firehouses were wider buildings with a second front apparatus door for a ladder truck. Central Station was much larger, but the smell of a barn was still pronounced. There were more apparatus at Central and more horses. A pair of horses pulled each apparatus. Fire destroyed Central Station in 1904, and a new feature was added to the following Central Station. It was a gymnasium beside the dormitory. The long hours spent at a station left firefighters in poor physical condition, according to an old timer, and the gymnasium provided a spot for the firefighters to stay physically fit. A notation on the new Central Station said the men "enjoyed the bathrooms" on the second floor. It is unknown if the older fire houses had a similar amenity, or only an outhouse. The water works was privately owned, and the city may have furnished only a tap or two, mainly to water and bathe the horses. Bathing facilities, however, were not unique to Central Station. Fire House No. 6, built a year earlier, had baths for the men. A 1904 publication reported the new fire station was "finished in oil, has hot and cold baths and other conveniences, of which the old-time firemen never so much as dreamed." Typical Day
A typical day at a fire house after arising was to care for the horses, check the equipment and clean the fire house, in that order. Horses always came first. It was more costly to replace a well-trained horse than it was to replace a firefighter. The driver was responsible for the care of the horses, but the firefighters chipped in with the task. The sawdust used to bed the horses had to be removed from the stalls each morning, along with the manure. New sawdust was laid in the stalls. The hay boxes and water trough were refilled. Each horse was cleansed and curried. Harnesses were soaped and washed. The horses were fed their daily ration of grain. (Some horses, it has been told, learned to unlock a grain box with their teeth and empty the box during the night.) Firefighters pitched in to load the manure and old sawdust onto the manure wagon as it made the rounds each morning. After the horses were cared for, the men could take their hour off for breakfast, one at a time. A supernumerary took their place when they left. Most of the few married men on the department did not take their meal breaks until evening, when they took off the full three hours to be with their families. Then it was off to check the equipment and maintain the rigs. Maintaining a steamer came under the jurisdiction of the engineer. He had special training for the job and was paid extra. (Some fire departments required an engineer to be licensed, which had to be renewed annually out of his pocket.) There were a myriad of valves, gauges, pipes, rods and grease cups that had to be meticulously checked, wiped, drained, oiled or greased. Hose had to be cleaned, if there had been a fire during the night. Hose at the time was triple-jacketed cotton, rubber-lined with heavy brass couplings, and weighed much more than the two-and-a-half hose today. The hose was laid out on a hose rack to dry. It was long before hose dryers. Dry hose was rolled and stored in stacks on the floor of the apparatus room. Hose in the hose wagons was changed every 30 days, if there had been no fires. There was a trick to removing the ground ladders each morning to clean and inspect for splinters, loose ties, and spots missing shellac. Laddermen did not merely release a ladder lock to remove the ladders, as they do today. They had to first remove the steering column of the tiller's steering wheel. The column ran down between the rungs of the single stack of ladders. The wooden aerial ladder was given the same type of inspection, although the ladder was probably not raised each morning. Both the bed ladder and the fly were raised mechanically by large wheel cranks on either side of the ladders. It took total human muscle. Hydraulically-raised ladders had yet to be invented. Nor did the bed ladder have springs to assist in raising the bed ladder. The cranks needed to be liberally lubricated to make the raising of the old aerial ladder a bit easier. It was somewhat easier caring for the minor equipment, compared with what is carried on ladder trucks today. There were no gasoline powered saws, acetylene torches, electric generators, power tools, Jaws of Life, or other type of equipment. In fact, Houston ladder trucks lacked much of the minor equipment required by the NBFU. Cleaning the dormitory and apparatus room followed the checking and cleaning of the apparatus. It was probably the same mundane job that present-day firefighters face. One of the advantages Houston firefighters had over other firefighters, even today, was not having the daily chore of polishing the poles. Houston always had galvanized sliding poles (except in today's Station 33). It was a hard, monotonous job keeping brass poles slick for a quick descent. Horses were exercised by saddle three times a day. They were trotted a block or so from the fire house and back. If there had been no alarms, the horses were hitched to the apparatus three times a day. Sick and injured horses were sent to either Station 8 or Station 9 where there were extra stalls. The fire department had four reserve horses kept in the extra stalls. One of the firefighters was a veterinarian and cared for an ailing horse. Watch Firefighters stood watch around the clock. They greeted visitors during a day watch, announced the arrival of a chief, and informed the captain of unusual happenings, similar to what firefighters on watch do today. A difference was the early firefighter had to inspect the apparatus at the beginning of each watch to see that all of the equipment on the apparatus were fastened in place and in good order. Also he made sure a broom and scoop were handy to immediately clean up the fresh manure. The fire department was quite strict about watches. Personnel files of the early firefighters are filled with suspension slips for men who fell asleep on watch or violated some other unwritten rule for a watchmen. A few of the firefighters were terminated for repeat offenses. No appeal. There was mention of outside watches in some of the references. Exactly what was involved was never understood. It may have been walking the neighborhood looking for fire. One reference mentioned outside watches were brutal in the wintertime. The fire department ended the practice in 1913 and hired civilians for the outside watch. After Routine Ladder companies were required to drill each week in front of the fire house. Engine companies drilled at least each month by coupling the steamer to a hydrant and pumping water through a hose for 30 minutes. It depended on a captain if the men were drilled more than what was required. Firefighters inspected fire hydrants in their first-in territory once a month, or so an inspection by NBFU in 1910 reported. No records were kept. Plugs that needed attention were called in to the water department. (Knowing firefighters, it is probable that the inspections never took place or, at least, not as often as claimed.) Idle hours of
the firefighters were never mentioned. How they
were spent is conjecture. There was no need to
study for promotion examinations; the fire chief
made all promotions. No one had time for outside
employment, so a firefighter did not have to give
attention to a side job while on duty. Play Boy had yet to hit the news stands. About all there was to wile away idle time was a game or two of dominoes and, to escape a hot fire house, sit out front and oogle the passing women. (Sitting in front of the fire station was outlawed in the 50s.) As night fell, firefighters would retire to their bed. It was not a pleasant sleep. No heat or air conditioning. A dormitory buzzed with mosquitos, horse flies and other pesky insects. Odors from the horses below permeated the dormitory. Sounds of grinding bits grated the nerves, as horses chewed their bedding throughout the night. Bridle bits were never removed from the mouth of a horse except for the daily feeding of grain. Response To Fire
Excitement peaked at a fire house when the loud gong above the watch desk rang out an alarm of fire. A Gamewell register clicked away on the watch desk punching the box number along the thin ribbon of paper. Lights flashed on. The stall chains dropped automatically and released the horses. Horses trotted to the front of an apparatus and backed into position. Firefighters hit the poles, and clamored aboard their position. One man positioned the suspended or swing harness onto the horses and snapped the quick-locking catch. Reins were hooked to the bridle bits. Each man had counted the number of clangs from the gong, which gave a hint where the fire was. The bell tapped out the box number of the fire box nearest to the fire. In the distance could be heard the fire bell in a tower of the Market Square House pealing the same signal. The fire bell could be heard across the city. Firefighters on their day off and on meal breaks were required to return when a fire was in the high value district and for second alarms elsewhere in the city. No overtime pay rewarded the returning firefighters. Where a fire company did not make the fire on the first alarm, the firefighters had to stand by for ten minutes. They stayed ready in case a second alarm was sounded. Every remaining fire company rolled at the stroke of a 2-11. Those companies scheduled on the second alarm rolled to the fire, and the other fire companies moved up to Central Station. If a second alarm did not sound within 10 minutes, the horses were put back into the stall, and the men went back to their work or dominos, or back to bed at nighttime. Still Alarms Not all alarms came in over the Gamewell system. The dispatcher would use the telephone for a reported small fire that he felt could be handled by a single engine company. The dispatcher had to go through the telephone company's central switchboard to reach a fire house. Conversely, a captain had to go through the telephone operator to reach the dispatcher or assistant chief on duty. (Captains reported to the assistant chief.) The fire department had yet to install a telephone system of its own. A still alarm only alerted the fire house that responded. None of the other fire companies had to bunker out and hitch up the horses, as they did on a box alarm. On to the Fire If a company made the alarm, the stoker disconnected the oil heater that kept the water hot in the boiler. Both the engineer and stoker rode the tailboard of the steamer. As the steamer cleared the fire house, the stoker lit the kindling in the fire box. A cloud of black smoke bellowed from the stack, and shortly a trail of burning embers were raining to the street. The hose wagon was right behind catching the brunt of the hot embers. Pipemen held fast to their hose wagon, laddermen hugged a spot atop the aerial or side of a service truck, and chemicalmen grasp the handrail of a chemical engine. Central and Fire House 3 had the only chemical wagons. The ride to the fire was quite rough. Most of the apparatus had no springs. None had pneumatic tires. The bones of the firefighters vibrated as each iron-rimmed wheel rolled over the cobble stones or other covering of the street. It was really bone-jarring when a wheel of a sharp-turning apparatus topped a curb. At the Fire
The plugcatcher of the first hose company arriving at a burner caught the closest fire hydrant to a fire. His hose line became sacred. It was a direct line supplied only by hydrant pressure. No matter what, the line was not to be cut. (This policy was still around more than a half century later.) Later arriving hose companies caught other plugs. Their hose lines fed the steamer placed near the fire. Sometimes a steamer hooked to a plug, and supplied one or two lines. Only Steamer 1 could supply more than two hose lines. All of the other steams, except one, were smaller sized engines rated at 500-550 gpm. Engine 10 was a third size engine rated at 650 gpm and, with good hydrant pressure, could squeeze out enough water for a third line. Chemicalmen tripped the acid bottle into the water solution in the tanks and dragged the small chemical hose to the fire. (Seventy percent of the fires were extinguished by a chemical line, including still alarms.) They attempted to hold the fire until the steamer had built a head of steam. It was a useless tactic unless a fire was not too far beyond the incipient stage. The men retreated after the larger hoses were moved in. The engineer controlled the pumps of a steamer, and the stoker kept the fire under the boiler producing steam to run the pumps. It took a good stoker to keep sufficient steam. Houston's stokers may not have been all that good after viewing a 1910 NBFU report that commented: "Engineers operated their engines on the pump test with skill, but several were seriously hampered by poor stoking." The stoker gave a signal on a steam whistle when his coal supply ran low. (Coal was consumed at a rate of 100 to 125 pounds for a steamer flowing 210 gpm at 65 psi pump pressure.) A hose wagon then raced to Central Station. Several tons of sacked coal was stored at headquarters. The driver would load his wagon and distribute the sacks of coal among the pumping steamers. Horses were led away by the driver from a steamer near the fire and to a safe spot (as shown in the picture above). Pipemen, on the other hand, were led into a fire by the captain who manned a playpipe tipped with a one-and-an-eighth-inch nozzle. Personal gear offered minimal protection. Leather helmets, warped from the heat and water of previous fires, covered the head. Coats were of rubber with a thin lining. Many a firefighter suffered burns to the shoulders from radiant heat when they got too close to the flames. Breathing protection was a damp sponge or bit of rag crammed into the mouth, or an unlit cigar clamped between the teeth. There were no Texas Fire Commission or OSHA in those days. After the horses were secured in a safe place, the driver fell in to fight the fire or took over firing the boiler if the steamer lacked a stoker. Still, horses were not completely out of danger. There were occasions when falling embers from a steamer burned the back of a horse. If the men could not make a building, they stayed in the street pouring water through the windows. There were few heavy stream appliances to supplement the hose streams. The fire department only had a deluge set on the aerial truck and a turret nozzle on one of the hose wagons. It was not until 1912 that the fire department got greater fire power for firefighting from the street with the purchase of a water tower. Compared to today, there were plenty of men assigned to the ladder companies. Eight men rode the service trucks (only two rode the aerial). Almost all of the laddermen were needed to raise the giant 50-foot ground extension ladders with their tormentor poles or to handle the life net. There were twelve positions surrounding a net, all of which had to be filled to safely catch a victim jumping from upper floors. (Five stories was the maximum height to safely catch a jumper; however there was one jump recorded in New York where a jumper was safely caught from the seventh floor.) Overhead telegraph and electric wires lined the streets. The wires hampered the raising of a ladder, especially the longer extension ladders. It was quite a task maneuvering a 50-foot ladder around the wiring to reach an upper floor of a building. Canopies on the front of many buildings in those days hindered the placement of ground ladders. When the aerial ladder was pressed into service, it took some strong arms. The laddermen had to crank up the bed ladder by hand. This was followed by a repeat performance of the fly ladder. Rotation of the turntable was also made by hand. The weight of the bed and fly ladders made the job of lowering somewhat easier. "Truckies" had it easier than today's firefighters when it came to salvage. They ignored salvage work. Salvage covers were not part of their inventory. Nor were canvas runners, sump pumps, hangers, and sprinkler wedges. Insurance companies in other large cities did the salvage work, but Houston's insurance companies never got around to organizing a salvage corp. in Houston. Multiple Alarm A second alarm was pulled when a fire exceeded what the first alarm companies could handle. The captain could signal a second alarm, or the fire chief or assistant fire chief would pull another alarm when either arrived. Top chiefs responded to box alarms in those days. There were no district chiefs. An additional alarm could be transmitted by either telephone or from a nearby fire alarm box. Telephones were not too common at the time, and a fire alarm box was the preferred method. Each fire box had a telegraph key locked inside that connected to the fire alarm office. Special signals on the telegraph key notified the dispatcher of the type of extra equipment needed. Signals could send an extra engine company or extra ladder truck, or a full second or third alarm. After a third alarm was pulled, empty hose wagons at the fire returned to Central Station. The driver loaded the hose bed and stood by for another fire. It is presumed firefighters who were on their day off or on meal leave returned to make up a hose company. Reserve apparatus were also pressed into service. A general alarm, or what Houston called a "reserve alarm," brought every fire company and reserve apparatus to a fire. There was no mention of how the fire department handled simultaneous fires during a reserve alarm. Post-Fire Work
After a fire was knocked down, laddermen opened walls to check for hidden fire. Pipemen or chemicalmen stood by with charged hose lines. Service trucks and the aerial truck had no booster tank. (Service trucks did have a pair of three-gallon hand extinguishers, which were hardly enough water for overhaul.) Excess water was channeled from the building and burned debris shoveled through windows, A couple of the men would be detailed as a fire watch throughout the night. Hose lines in the street were uncoupled, drained and rolled. The hose rolls, now considerably heavier than a dry roll, were pitched onto the hose wagons. Nozzles were returned to their holders. Back at the station, there was plenty of work for the men. First it was a chore getting the apparatus into the fire house if it lacked a rear door (which all of the fire houses had in Houston). There is no record of Houston having turntables in a fire house, as did other fire departments. Horses pulled into a fire house head first, if a fire house had a turntable in the floor. The horses were unleashed, and the firefighters would rotate the apparatus. Without a
turntable, the horses were unleashed in the street,
and the men backed the apparatus by hand into the
fire house. Horses always came first after the apparatus were back in place. They were treated for burns, if embers had burned them. Each horse was rubbed down from head to hoof. A rubdown continued until the temperature of a horse returned to normal. Hooves were sponged and carefully examined for nails and stones. Bits were removed while the mouth of a horse was cleaned. They were not fed nor watered until completely back to normal. The harness was soaped and rinsed, and suspended again from the ceiling. All of the equipment got thoroughly cleaned and checked. Dry hose was loaded on the hose wagon. A fire box on the steamer was cleaned (ashes were usually dumped in the street before returning from the fire) and repacked with excelsior, kindling, and coal. The coal bunker was replenished with fresh coal, and the heater was reconnected to the boiler. Ladders were cleaned and checked on the ladder trucks. The life net had to be opened and laid out to dry, if it had gotten wet. Hemp life lines too had to be stretch out and dried. The raising mechanism of the aerial ladder was cleaned and oiled. Ground ladders were checked and dried after disassembling the steering column to release the ladders. Chemicalmen refilled the tanks with water into which sodium carbonate was dissolved. The pair of tanks held 40 to 60 gallons each. Sulfuric acid was replenished in the acid bottle. (When mixed, the acid and bicarbonate reacted and propelled the water through the chemical hose.) This was a time well before the term hazardous materials had been coined, and the federal government had yet to publish volumes of hazmat regulations. The men wore no respirator, chemical gloves, face shield, and rubber apron to protect them as they transferred the acid. Captains did have it over the modern day fire captain when it came to records. There were no records to complete. No fire report, no NFIRS report, no injury report, no written details of a fire. The only record of a fire in the old days was made by the secretary of the fire department, which merely mentioned the date, the address of a fire and the number of hose lines laid by each company. Promotions How soon a regular firefighter was eligible for a higher position is unknown. (Some fire departments required six months.) The fire chief made the appointment based on his assessment of the man. Seniority, the efficiency of service, and ability to handle men were considered for the job of a captain. Potential engineers and stokers were first examined by the fire department's machinist. The machinist recommended to the fire chief those he felt could handle the specialized ranks. City civil service did not come about until 1914, however it focused mainly on recruiting. Candidates had to compete on medical, physical, and moral examinations. Civil service had no effect on the customary promotion and demotion of officers at the change of a city administration. You could be captain one day and riding the tailboard the next day. Conversely, a firefighter could be made captain with an administrative change (if he had helped get a new mayor elected). This was the practice until State Civil Service came about in 1937. Retirement  Pensions were unheard of in the fire department. No fund existed to provide for retirement and permanent disability. Enactment of a pension fund was years away. After a firefighter could no longer perform his job, he was gone. He had to find some other way to survive, unless he was one of the lucky ones picked as watchman at one of the fire houses. House watchmen, however, did not show up for several years after the department went fully paid. On the other hand, fire horses were treated much differently. They were retired to the city park after a pampered life. A horse could wear out quickly from the race to fires pulling a heavy steamer or ladder truck day after day. The smell of wood smoke quickened the pace of the horses and took an added toll. Nothing stopped them in their race to a fire. There are recordings of a horse racing on to a fire dragging the other horse that had fallen. Some cities sold their fire horses after retirement. They were put to work pulling an ice wagon or other such conveyance. Not so in Houston, the city provided for them the rest of their days, unlike a firefighter.
Present day firefighters may feel things are pretty tough in the Houston Fire Department. But really, they have it quite easy. Nothing they put up with today can remotely compare to the miserable life of a firefighter in the era of the horses. |
