HISTORY OF CANTON FIRE DEPARTMENT

HISTORY OF CANTON FIRE DEPARTMENT

为52美元,000, which the city of Canton, Ohio, annually devotes to the upkeep and betterment of its fire department, it receives the fullest measure of service. This policy the municipality has observed almost from the very beginning of its existence as an incorporated borough and dates back to the early 80's, when the establishment of a factory for watches, gave employment to a large number of people and pushed Canton to the front as an industrial centre. Long before that time, however, Canton had a lire department composed entirely of volunteers, and in no respect very different from similar organisations in other places. In 1 Ht»8 the initiative was taken, if only in a small way, in the formation of a paid fire department, when one man was engaged to remain permanently in the enginehouse, so as to be on hand to start a lire in the engine when an alarm was turned in, care for and harness the horses, and drive them to machine to the scene of the fire, where the volunteers did the work. The enginehouse stood at the northwest corner of Court and Eighth streets, where the centre enginehouse was afterwards erected, and where the new central fire and police building, fronting on West Seventh, Court and West Eighth streets, is at present being erected. The system then in vogue, of course, gave rise to much delay. The three horses, when not at a fire, were engaged in street work, from which they had to be taken off, haul the steamer and the hose reel, and the volunteer firemen had to be summoned by the alarm bell. Th'steamer was of Amoskeag make and is still in the city’s service.

Today’s fire department dates back to 1883, when the present city hall and the late central enginehouse on the site of the public safety building were erected on the block bounded by Cleveland avenue, Court, Seventh and Eighth street were finished. Jn this house were stationed a steamer, a hook and ladder company and a new hose reel manned by a freshly raised company of volunteers, who, with five paid men, formed the department, under John Leininger, the present electrician, as chief engineer and driver, with Henry Neuman as a second permanent driver, and Robert O. Mesnar, then as now chief, Edward Reigler and Florin Rose as paid men. Chief Mesnar has risen to his present position from the lowest rank to the highest, having passed all the necessary competitive civil service examinations. With the enrolling of these paid men the volunteer force was disbanded and minute men were substituted—a system which was maintained up to a few years ago. Till the newest order of things was inaugurated there were always men enough in the enginehouse to take out the engine, which was operated by a crew regularly assigned to that work. These were paid at the rate of 40 cents an hour from the time the alarm sounded on the bell of the old First Baptist church until the fire was out, provided they reported at the scene of the blaze and at the rollcall at the central firehouse. The bell was operatd by a windlass arrangement, and a code adopted for the alarm. The old order has changed, giving place to the new, in the shape of the Gamewell fire alarm telegraph system, which has succeeded the big city hall gong, that had ousted the old bell. The gong still sounds by means of electrical devices connected with the Gamewell system.