The first fire company in New Hanover Township was in Fagleysville. It existed for a brief time around 1920. A long-time resident, the late Pete Ganovsky, recalled the alarm was a great iron wagon tire with a slit in it hanging from a tree. Hit it with a hammer, and the ringing “clang” would echo down the valley. The firehouse was a barn that stood on the location that is now the parking lot of the All Star Cafe (previously the Fagleysville Hotel). The engine and hose wagon were on the ground floor. On the second floor, there was a room where the Grange would meet and the fire company would sponsor hoedowns and other events. Ironically, the building and contents were said to have burned after a year or two, and the company was never reactivated.
We have two Fagleysville fire company artifacts. First, in the showcase of the New Hanover Fire Company are two “ribbons” that would have been worn with a parade uniform. In the center of the pendant is a photo of a steam fire engine.
The second artifact is in the New Hanover Historical Society’s archives. We have the handwritten constitution and bylaws of that fire company, 20 pages in Herbert B. Wagner’s handwriting. He lived in the white-brick house at the intersection of Wagner Road and Swamp Pike and taught in the Fagleysville Independent School for many years. At the end of that document are the signatures of the founding members who were all property owners in Fagleysville and vicinity.
The charter members were: Herbert B. Wagner, Casper Erb, Charles Pfeiffer, Henry Gauger, Calvin Heimbach, Jacob B. Gauger, Kevin Buck, Frank G. Thompson, J. L. Hetrick, Elmer S. Renninger, Frank J. Rutkowsky, James S. Faust, William A. Heimbach, Henry Kurtz, Paul S. Anders, John W. Hafer, Lawrence S. Yerger, Walter Schaeffer, Henry Rutkowsky and Christopher Fizz.
The constitution and bylaws are undated, but it appears the founding date had to be about 1919 or 1920. The late Janet Hetrick Groves reported that her grandfather J.L. Hetrick, who is a signatory, moved here in 1919. Also, the bylaws spell out penalties for dispensing or selling intoxicating liquors. Prohibition went into effect in 1920. This suggests that the founding had to be sometime after 1919 and before 1921.
The constitution and bylaws spell out in great detail the organizational structure and the duties of the officers. “The officers of this Company shall consist of a President, Vice President, Recording Secretary, Treasurer, three Trustees, Fire Chief, Assistant Chief, Foreman of Engine, Foreman of Hose, and five men as Board of Directors. Elected Annually.” There follow 20 pages of articles and subsections.
A few of these sections may be of interest.
Article 14, Section One: “It shall be the duty of each member to repair immediately to the engine house at every alarm of fire, and assist in conveying the apparatus to the fire, and if it shall have been taken away before he arrives at the fire house he shall proceed to the fire and render what assistance he can in subduing the fire. The drag rope is the place for every member except the acting foreman to assist in drawing the same to the fire, to remain where he is stationed, and to attend to any duty to which he may be detailed by any officer in command. It shall be the duty of any member arriving first at the engine house to take the trumpet and act as foreman during the absence of [?]. Upon the arrival of the regular officer he shall surrender command to such officer.”
Article 15, section Three:”Any member guilty of gambling in any way, distributing or causing to be distributed any intoxicating liquors in or about the fire house upon any occasion, or loitering about the engine house in an intoxicated manor or be guilty of any indiscreet conduct shall be fined fifty cents for the first offence, and for the second offence he shall be subject to expulsion.” This would indicate organization prior to prohibition.
What type of engine did they have? It surely would not have been a steamer. Steam fire engines were large, heavy and expensive. The Boyertown Museum of Historic Vehicles has one; it’s a beautiful tangle of pipes, levers and gauges. Fire horses galloping at a dead run hauling the steamer billowing smoke is an urban scene. Locally, Pottstown had two steam fire engines at the turn of the century, at Goodwill Fire Company and Philadelphia Fire Engine Company. But country fire departments didn’t have them; indeed, there were almost no country fire departments.
“The steamer was not widely used in Montgomery County, for several reasons, the most important being cost. An American LaFrance steamer was priced at $4,350 in 1892, whereas a chemical engine cost only about $350. Furthermore, a steamer usually required horses and a heated firehouse, both of which needed a full time attendant. Thus only the largest communities could afford steamers” (Montgomery County: The Second Hundred Years).
New Hanover Township 1741-1991 quotes long time resident Mr. Gordon Hafer as saying that the Fagleysville engine was a “horse drawn wagon with a hand operated water pump.” It is unclear what a “hand operated water pump” meant. With a classic hand operated pump, 10 or more men pumped a horizontal bar up and down. This bar was attached to the fire wagon and worked a pump that pressurized a line. It was a colonial era apparatus. They could have had one of these, but by 1920 it would have been an antique.
It is more likely they had something called a chemical fire engine, a contraption that was used for just a few years before motorized fire trucks became common. They worked on the same principal as soda-acid fire extinguishers. Again, from Montgomery County… “After 1890 when most Montgomery County Fire Companies started, the chemical fire engine had become popular. Invented in 1867 and costing, as mentioned, as little as $350, it consisted of a light carriage carrying two tanks, either full of water or filled at the scene. Soda was dumped into one and acid into the other. These solutions, mixed at the pump, produced a pressurized stream as long as the water held out.” If you want to see the principle in action, put a half teaspoon of baking soda into a half-glass of vinegar.
It was “hand operated” in that the firemen manned a pump, but the pump was for the suction line to draw water into the engine, not the pressure line to discharge it. Where would their water supply have been on Fagleysville Hill? Could they have put the suction line down into hand dug wells?
A sentence in the Fagleysville Fire Company bylaws lends further evidence to the idea that they had a chemical fire engine: Article 11, “It shall be the duty of the Foreman of Engine to see that the engine is placed in the proper position. He shall see that there is always a supply of compound on hand to mix the chemicals for immediate use.” This certainly suggests a chemical fire engine.
Whatever it was, it burned with the building, and so closes the story of the Fagleysville Fire Company.
The Historian is produced by the New Hanover Historical Society. Call Robert Wood at 610-326-4165 with comments.