Sterling Siren Fire Alarm
Posted 23-May-2008
"Sterling Siren Fire Alarm" Copyright © F.D. All Rights Reserved
Sterling Box
RFD 1907 Water Tower
Rochester FD Tractor #8
In a time when much firefighting apparatus arrived at the fire behind a team of horses, and firemen ran to fires from wherever they were when the alarm was called, bells were the standard alerting device on equipment, and even atop firehouses. In some larger cities steam whistles alerted the firemen and were blown in a coded pattern to advise responders of the fire's location. Gamewell even offered a steam whistle blower that could be electrically connected to the incoming alarm telegraph system. The whistle blower eliminated the need for a Central Station Operator to open and close the steam whistle valve in the appropriate pattern for the box of alarm origin. Even as new chain driven motorized tractors replaced horses, and steam propelled pumpers were racing to the fire at 8 miles an hour, bells were the standard alert. The driver of the pumper had his hands full with the horses, the engineer was on the tailboard bringing his fire and steam pressure up, and the Officer was yanking himself silly on the bell rope as the machine hurtled toward the fire. That would begin to change in 1913. Equipment still had bells, but now equipment either came from the manufacturer with or could be retrofitted with a siren. The hand cranked siren soon proved to be superior to the bell as an alerting device, and more and more equipment was fitted with sirens.
The consensus in the available literature on firefighting seems to be that the first Fire Siren arrived in the US in 1913. It was a hand cranked siren touted as superior to the then-in-use bell mounted on most firefighting equipment as a way to clear a path to the fire scene. The idea of sirens rapidly caught on, and hand cranked sirens were quickly mounted on fire equipment. Fire Houses of course still had BELLS. The reality was a lot of Fire Houses still didn't have electricity.