Population 485 (4 page)

Our little volunteer department is actually a compromise drawn on the concepts of both Pliny and Trajan. We are organized and are a part of the local political scene inasmuch as we subsist in part on taxes, but because none of us is a career firefighter, we are for the most part descendants of Trajan’s general public, trained to use equipment owned by the community at large.

The first firefighting equipment of record in New Auburn is referenced in the handwritten minutes of a village board meeting held April 2, 1902. “
Farmer’s Store Cos. Bill for $2.28 for pails used at Hoard’s fire, recommended to the consideration of the board. Accepted, carried.
”

Not so fast there, Smokey. Four days later, April 6, 1902:
“Pail bill disallowed.
” No reason given.

For the next three years, there are no more mentions of firefighting, but apparently, forward-thinking citizens realized borrowed pails weren’t going to cut it in the long run. On June 3, 1905, the village board minutes contain the following entry, an entry which years hence would put me face-to-face with the One-Eyed Beagle:

A typewritten report from the Committee on fire protection and apparatus of their recommendations of May 27th and June 2nd, ’05, was read and report filed with Clerk.

Moved and seconded that we approve of the recommendations of said Committee on fire protection in procuring fire fighting apparatus that will comply with the requirements of the insurance companies in raising our village from a fifth rate to a fourth rate town. Carried.

Duly note we are not just some fifth-rate town.

Moved and seconded that the Chairmen of the finance and street committees and the president of the village board negotiate with the American La France Fire Engine Company and procure their best terms and purchase one double 35 gallon Chemical Engine
[rather than using a pump, the water pressure in a chemical engine was generated by combining water, soda, and acid in a sealed tank]
as per specifications furnished by their agent T. R. Johnstone under date of June 3rd and exhibited in writing. Carried.

If you’re going to have a fire truck, you better have a fire chief. And he’ll need minions and underlings. We move to July 1, 1905:

Moved and seconded that for the purpose of organizing a volunteer fire company we hereby appoint Thomas W. Peterson as Fire Chief he to select his own assistants. Carried.

On August 2, 1905, it was time to kick the tires:

The Chemical Engine which was shipped by the LaFrance Company having arrived the president appointed a committee to check over invoice of paraphernalia and to see that the village gets a good demonstration of what the engine will do.

Three days pass. In minutes dated August 5, 1905, it appears agent T. R. Johnstone had a bad day:

The exhibition given by the agent was not satisfactory to the board and they asked Mr. Johnstone to give them a further demonstration to show what a chemical engine could accomplish.

The representative of the company agreed to do this on Monday, August 7, and the board adjourned to await the call of the president.

So they chewed the whole thing over for a few days. I imagine T.R. Johnstone in a room at the Hotel Auburn, downing stomach powders and calculating lost commissions. I don’t think he ever had anything to worry about. Small-town folk want to appear skeptic and shrewd, but more than that, we really, really want the newfangled doodad. I imagine the board members met around town and did some dismissive bloviating, but you can hear corollary expositions in the local café to this very day, when some local goes on at length and volume about the frivolous vacuity of satellite television or Indian casinos, then hurries home to watch
Silk Stalkings
before catching the courtesy bus to bingo night. We know we’re rubes, we just don’t want to be
taken
for rubes. So they made old T.R. sweat some, and they performed some procedural gymnastics, but on August 10, 1905, New Auburn got itself a fire truck:

Board met in special session at call of President to make settlement of the matter of the chemical engine…the committee on Engine reported that they did not prepare another demonstration feeling that it would not satisfy all, there being so much sentiment against the engine, and thus they would save extra cost. The committee was satisfied that the first exhibition was not a fair test. Committee’s report was on motion, seconded. Adopted.

Moved and seconded to postpone the acceptance and settlement till some future time. Motion lost.

Motion made that we reject this engine. Motion lost.

Motion and second that we accept the engine and that the President and Clerk be authorized to draw an order for ($200) two hundred dollars to make first payment on contract and to sign all necessary warrants in settlement of the same. Carried by unanimous vote. Moved and carried to adjourn.

Really, the village board deserves a little credit. In the space of three months, our burg went from appropriated buckets to a full-blown department. From fifth rate to fourth rate.

The chief arranged to store the fire engine at the village hall. The local marshal hauled it to fire scenes at a buck a shot. (The same minutes that indicate the marshal was paid $4 for hauling the fire engine to four different fires also indicated that he was paid $2.60 “for care of tramps.”) There remained the difficulty of alerting firefighters to the presence of a fire. The solution came about on January 6, 1906, in the form of fortuitous fallout from a controversy involving school equipment:

To set aside future misunderstanding it was moved and carried that the ownership of the school bell be transferred to school district No. 11, the Village to reserve the right of the use of the bell by the Fire department for fire and practice call.

Just over three years later, in the minutes of February 3, 1909, it was recorded that an order for $200 was drawn “to pay the final note on the Village fire engine.” Six months later, on August 4, 1909, the minutes state that “a representative of a hook and ladder company was present and laid a proposition before the Board for them to consider the purchase of a hook and ladder truck.”

This is the thing about firefighters. You give them toys, and they want more toys. Today we have seven trucks. Two pumpers, three tankers, one rapid-attack pumper, and a rescue van. One of the pumpers is twenty-seven years old. We use it mostly to fight wildfires. The Beagle is one of the few people on the department able to run it with confidence. The new pumper is fourteen years old. It has an open, rear-facing cab unit in which three firefighters can ride. In the winter, by the time you get to the scene, your fingers are so cold you can’t work the buckles on the air packs. The tankers hold roughly 2,300 gallons of water each. Because we rarely have access to fire hydrants, we use a shuttle system, running water to the fire scene in a constant rotation of tankers. The rapid-attack pumper is our newest vehicle. We got it primarily for fighting brush fires (it has four-wheel drive and winches fore and aft), but with its on-board water and twin inch-and-a-half hose reels, it can be invaluable in getting an early jump on a house fire while the main pumper is being set up. The rescue van is a 1985 Ford panel van. We bolted an old school-bus seat to the floor and use it mainly for responding to medical emergencies.

All of the rigs carry extra equipment. Two of the tankers are equipped with small outboard pumps and can be used to fight grass fires. The main pumper is crammed with gear—air packs, fire axes, an array of nozzles and couplers, 1,200 feet of hose, chimney fire equipment, powerful flashlights, a roof saw, a collapsible water reservoir, hose wrenches, suction apparatus, a generator, a rackful of ladders. Our most recent acquisition is a thermal imager. It can see through smoke, detect heat inside a wall, show the outline of a body in the darkness. It is, in short, magic. It fits in a case half the size of a pillow. It cost $15,000.

Some of the money we have to raise on our own. It’s not all covered by the tax rolls. Fund-raisers are a way of life in most volunteer departments. We’ll have a pancake breakfast now and then, or sell some barbecued chicken. We have a raffle almost every year. For as long as I can remember, two of the top five prizes have been firearms. I always get a kick out of that. All the efforts to do away with guns, and here we are giving them away.

Our most well-worn money-maker is the Jamboree Days beer tent. We run it for three days in conjunction with a softball tournament. The softball tournament kicks off on Friday night with an exhibition game between our fire department and the fire department from the city of Chetek, nine miles to the north. A lot of the guys on the Chetek department play league ball. A lot of the guys on our department play pinochle. It shows. We get trounced on a yearly basis, but it’s a real good time. Not too serious, a lot of hollering and shenanigans. Beer cups in the outfield. It pays off in little ways throughout the year when the two departments fulfill their mutual aid agreements by helping each other out on big calls. You’re in a ditch somewhere, or packing up to head into a burning barn, and you recognize the person helping you as the same guy that blew a shoe rounding third, or who lent you his glove in the outfield. It gives you a little human common ground. The chiefs and government representatives hash out the specifics of the mutual aid contract at big tables during long meetings. The spirit of the contract works itself out on the softball field.

The real softball tournament kicks off at eight
A.M
. on Saturday, runs ’til dark, and picks up again Sunday morning. Teams come from all over. The softball field is directly adjacent to the beer tent, which is no accident—amateur softball players are your prime suds demographic. We always hope for hot weather. When it rains, the teams still show up, but beer sales tank.

The Beagle feels he is past his softball prime, so he spends most of the weekend tending the beer-tent bar. He’ll usually punch out early Saturday night so he can drink and dance some, but the rest of the weekend, you can find him behind the plywood stand, filling pitchers. Last year the Beagle and I got down to the park early Sunday morning to do a little cleanup before the crowds arrived. It wasn’t even nine
A.M
. and the first softball game of the day was already under way. We were picking up plastic cups and straightening tables when this guy walked into the tent and asked if he could get a beer. “I guess there’s no law against it,” said the Beagle. He went behind the bar and got a clean cup. The guy propped his elbows on the plywood. I didn’t recognize him, but he wasn’t dressed for softball. Bob took his money and passed him the beer. The guy raised the cup, and just when it was at his lips, someone smacked a long fly ball. At the crack of the bat, the man’s head snapped to the right. His beer stayed right where it was, fixed in midair. He scanned the field for a minute, watched the outfielder make the catch, then brought his lips back in line with the cup, which hadn’t moved. Ducking forward to take a pull at the foam, he rolled his eyes at the Beagle and shook his head.

“Little early in the mornin’ for softball!”

The only equipment some of your early colonial firefighters had were leather buckets made by Dutch shoemakers. The firefighters worked in pairs, the buckets suspended between them on two parallel poles. A good team could hustle eighteen buckets. This being prior to the age of personalized license plates, many of the firefighters gussied up their buckets with embroidery and gold leaf. Without a pickup window in which to strategically hang their helmet and turnout gear, you probably had your guys who ran around town with their personalized bucket dangling off their mule. Operative theory being, chicks dig firefighters, and why should colonial chicks be any different?