THE BIRMINGHAM FIRE DEPARTMENT

OUR 2ND TRUCK

Birmingham's first little fire truck was nicknamed the "June Bug" because when it was loaded down with firemen it tended to hop along like a June Bug. It wasn't a very useful vehicle and so a new truck was purchased from Gramm-Bernstein, an Ohio firm that had built many Army trucks during World War-l. This was a heavy duty vehicle that carried a hose and ladders as well as some water. However, it was NOT a pumper. It didn't have a siren, either. It had an exhaust whistle. In the winter those big tires in the rear would be fitted with chains to help the truck in deep snow or on ice. Whenever it ran on bare pavement you could hear those chains rattling from quite a distance. Even into the 30's, after Birmingham had purchased an American La France pumper, when the paid firemen would get a call to a minor fire, they'd go out on the Gramm-Bernstein. If it was possibly a serious fire, the whistle atop the hose tower on the Municipal Building would blow and the Volunteers would head to the station and take out the pumper.

The American LaFrance Pumper

After the disastrous Field Building Fire in 1923, when pumpers had to be borrowed from nearby cities to send water all the way from the River Rouge to douse the flames, the Village Trustees decided that the city needed a pumper of its own and so they purchased the American LaFrance unit shown above. It is now owned by Bill Olsen, grandson of a former Fire Chief. It is shown here on display at the Adams Fire Station during Fire Prevention Week in the fall of 2009.

HERE'S A LITTLE MORE MODERN EQUIPMENT

By the 1970's, Birmingham had modernized and was using far better fire rigs than the old Gram-Bernstein. This photo was taken on a hot Sunday afternoon at the northeast corner of Merrill and Pierce Streets where a stubborn blaze was being fought in the building housing the VARSITY SPORTING GOODS SHOP. Formerly the ODD FELLOWS HALL. and later the TRADING POST the structure had been extensively remodeled with offices installed on the 2nd floor with a false ceiling above them. The structural changes made the blaze hard to bring under control.

This photo shows the weekend crowd that had gathered and you can get a better view of the roof damage from this viewpoint. Following the fire, quite a bit more remodeling of the structure took place. The VARSITY SHOP continued to stay in the same location for many years until finally moving to its presently location at Adams Square across the road from the Adams Fire Station.

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