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FDNY and NYC Firehouses and Fire Companies - 2nd Section
- Thread starter mack
- Start date
Back to E249/L113, when L 113 relocated to E 248 while their firehouse was being renovated in 1996, both E 248 and L 113 liked being together. L 147 and L157 were not as happy as their fire work was reduced. My father grew up on Midwood Street, around the corner from the firehouse on Rogers Avenue.
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249 and 113 worked for 280/132 during their Centennial celebration back in 2013. For decorations 280/132 had a giant pumpkin as the centerpiece of the display, which had an "Eye of the Storm" logo carved into it.. After the ceremony in quarters and while the men of 280/132 were out celebrating, the men of 249/113 carved the Rat logo into the pumpkin and placed it back into the display on the apparatus floor.
Thanks Mack for another great profile of a good house.
Thanks Mack for another great profile of a good house.
A very Special Thanks goes to our member Joe Materia, aka mack.
What a fabulous job you are doing in presenting us with the entire history of these companies.
I don’t think there is any better history of any FDNY company than what you have been passing on to the membership here.
It is "Top Shelf At It's Best"
Thanks Joe
What a fabulous job you are doing in presenting us with the entire history of these companies.
I don’t think there is any better history of any FDNY company than what you have been passing on to the membership here.
It is "Top Shelf At It's Best"
Thanks Joe
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- May 6, 2010
- Messages
- 16,229
^^^^^Well said Willy ...another excellent job by Joe.....i had covered as a LT in both Units on Rogers Ave when i first made LT.....one of the cool things they had was a large mural on the wall in their TV room .....it was the skyline of Gotham City like in Batman but instead of a Bat Signal being flashed by a searchlight it was a "RAT" Signal.
I did some research and found this concerning the above photo:
"The photo above would be the culmination of many young boys lives. After all, who didn't want to be either a ballplayer or a fireman... But to be both at the same time would cause most young minds to explode. Featured, you've got Dodger manager Chuck Dressen and pitcher Joe Black spending the afternoon as fireman - complete with Brooklyn Ladder 13 helmet and firetruck. No doubt Black, who was a phenom rookie reliever when this photo was taken in 1952, was in the midst of preparing to put out some wildfires at the Stadium and throughout the city."
Some further info and clarifications:
Chuck Dressen managed the Dodgers in '51, '52, and '53, averaging 99 wins and winning the pennant in '52 and '53.
Joe Black pitched for the Dodgers in '52, '53, and five games in '54, mostly as a reliever. He was the Rookie of the Year in '52 with a 15-4 record, an ERA of 2.15, and 15 saves.
Obviously they were wearing Ladder 113 helmets (only the 13 is visible on both). Chuck, being the manager, got to wear a Lieutenant's helmet. It's odd that Joe, a reliever (then known as a fireman, now a closer), wouldn't be wearing a helmet from the engine since he put out the fires, but the public is often misinformed about FD matters.
They each seem to be wearing their spikes.
Engine 14 firehouse 14 East 18th Street Flatiron District , Manhattan Division 1, Battalion 6 “Sweet 14”
Engine 14 organized 14 East 18th Street former volunteer firehouse 1865
Engine 14 moved 112 West 18th Street 1894
Engine 14 new firehouse 14 East 18th Street 1895
Engine 14 moved 340 East 14th Street at Engine 5 2000
Engine 14 returned 14 East 18th Street 2001
Battalion 6 temporary location 14 East 18th Street at Engine 14 2014
Pre-FDNY volunteer company:
Hose 29
Locations:
Ward/Mayflower Hose 29 79 Willett Street 1842-1854
Metamora Hose 29 E 21st Street & Broadway 1854-1856
Metamora Hose 29 E 19th Street & 3rd Avenue 1856-1858
Metamora Hose 29 E 21 Street 1858-1863
Metamora Hose 29 E 18th Street 1863-1865
1865 - Engine 14 was organized at Metamora Hose 29 quarters.
Engine 14 organized 14 East 18th Street former volunteer firehouse 1865
Engine 14 moved 112 West 18th Street 1894
Engine 14 new firehouse 14 East 18th Street 1895
Engine 14 moved 340 East 14th Street at Engine 5 2000
Engine 14 returned 14 East 18th Street 2001
Battalion 6 temporary location 14 East 18th Street at Engine 14 2014
Pre-FDNY volunteer company:
Hose 29
Locations:
Ward/Mayflower Hose 29 79 Willett Street 1842-1854
Metamora Hose 29 E 21st Street & Broadway 1854-1856
Metamora Hose 29 E 19th Street & 3rd Avenue 1856-1858
Metamora Hose 29 E 21 Street 1858-1863
Metamora Hose 29 E 18th Street 1863-1865
1865 - Engine 14 was organized at Metamora Hose 29 quarters.
Engine 14 (continued):
14 East 18th Street firehouse:
Daytonian in Manhattan
Friday, October 15, 2010
LeBrun's 1894 Engine Company No. 14
Just prior to the outbreak of the Civil War, Philadelphia architect Napoleon LeBrun moved his family to New York City. LeBrun won the enviable position as official architect of the New York City Fire Department in 1879. A year later when his son Pierre joined him in business, it became LeBrun & Son. In 1888 younger son Michel would also join the firm, subsequently renamed LeBrun & Sons.
Unlike the work of Nathaniel D. Bush, the architect for the New York Police Department during the same period, who created several carbon-copy station houses; LeBrun’s fire stations were nearly all unique. Each of the 42 LeBrun stations became progressively more ornate and in 1894, a year before designing their final firehouse, Engine Company 14 was erected at 14 East 18th Street. The architect had gone all-out.
LeBrun produced what the AIA Guide to New York City called “A delicate Italian Renaissance town house for fire engines.” Corinithian columns on the third floor support decorative arches over the windows with deeply-recessed carved fans. Between the second and third floors, swirling ribbons flank large terra cotta medallions pronouncing the date of construction.
“High above,” said the AIA Guide, “the frieze and cornice are rich in far-out, far-east detail.”
On September 11 the next year, Mayor A . Krebs and the Fire Commissioner escorted Colonel Varigault, the head of the Paris Fire Department, on a tour of New York fire headquarters. The French fireman was visiting New York to learn up-to-date practices and technology. The party then boarded carriages and “inspected the quarters of Engine Company No. 14,” according to The New York Times. The sparkling new station house was presented as the typical example of New York fire stations.
As evidenced by the 1896 station blotter, the Victorian fire fighters assigned to Engine Company 14 were not without a tender side. On July 22 of that year the blotter read “5:00 A.M. – Peter, cat, transferred to Bergh Society.” Peter had unfortunately eaten a poisoned rat.
A month later an entry documented “Aug. 25, 11:25 A.M. – While responding to an alarm for Station 343, Chops, cat, jumped from seat of tender at Broadway and Eighteenth Street, and was killed by being run over and having neck broken.”
The New York Times reported the next day “There was a sort of a wake over Chops at quarters last night, and a debate about the funeral. Arrangements were not perfected, but the cat will not be sent to the Potter’s Field for its kind – Barren Island. Fireman 'Joe' DeSize and Engineer A. W. Melvin are to devise a plan of last honors.”
For over a century the firefighters of Engine Company 14 have served the city valiantly, sometimes at the price of life. In 1956 Company No. 14 fought the tremendous Wanamaker fire on Broadway and Astor Place for a full day before bringing it under control.
LeBrun’s Italian Renaissance structure is as delicate and beautiful today as it was in 1894, still serving the city as an active fire house.
http://daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com/2010/10/lebruns-1894-engine-company-no-4.html
14 East 18th Street firehouse:
Daytonian in Manhattan
Friday, October 15, 2010
LeBrun's 1894 Engine Company No. 14
Just prior to the outbreak of the Civil War, Philadelphia architect Napoleon LeBrun moved his family to New York City. LeBrun won the enviable position as official architect of the New York City Fire Department in 1879. A year later when his son Pierre joined him in business, it became LeBrun & Son. In 1888 younger son Michel would also join the firm, subsequently renamed LeBrun & Sons.
Unlike the work of Nathaniel D. Bush, the architect for the New York Police Department during the same period, who created several carbon-copy station houses; LeBrun’s fire stations were nearly all unique. Each of the 42 LeBrun stations became progressively more ornate and in 1894, a year before designing their final firehouse, Engine Company 14 was erected at 14 East 18th Street. The architect had gone all-out.
LeBrun produced what the AIA Guide to New York City called “A delicate Italian Renaissance town house for fire engines.” Corinithian columns on the third floor support decorative arches over the windows with deeply-recessed carved fans. Between the second and third floors, swirling ribbons flank large terra cotta medallions pronouncing the date of construction.
“High above,” said the AIA Guide, “the frieze and cornice are rich in far-out, far-east detail.”
On September 11 the next year, Mayor A . Krebs and the Fire Commissioner escorted Colonel Varigault, the head of the Paris Fire Department, on a tour of New York fire headquarters. The French fireman was visiting New York to learn up-to-date practices and technology. The party then boarded carriages and “inspected the quarters of Engine Company No. 14,” according to The New York Times. The sparkling new station house was presented as the typical example of New York fire stations.
As evidenced by the 1896 station blotter, the Victorian fire fighters assigned to Engine Company 14 were not without a tender side. On July 22 of that year the blotter read “5:00 A.M. – Peter, cat, transferred to Bergh Society.” Peter had unfortunately eaten a poisoned rat.
A month later an entry documented “Aug. 25, 11:25 A.M. – While responding to an alarm for Station 343, Chops, cat, jumped from seat of tender at Broadway and Eighteenth Street, and was killed by being run over and having neck broken.”
The New York Times reported the next day “There was a sort of a wake over Chops at quarters last night, and a debate about the funeral. Arrangements were not perfected, but the cat will not be sent to the Potter’s Field for its kind – Barren Island. Fireman 'Joe' DeSize and Engineer A. W. Melvin are to devise a plan of last honors.”
For over a century the firefighters of Engine Company 14 have served the city valiantly, sometimes at the price of life. In 1956 Company No. 14 fought the tremendous Wanamaker fire on Broadway and Astor Place for a full day before bringing it under control.
LeBrun’s Italian Renaissance structure is as delicate and beautiful today as it was in 1894, still serving the city as an active fire house.
http://daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com/2010/10/lebruns-1894-engine-company-no-4.html
Last edited:
Engine 14 (continued):
14 East 18th Street firehouse:
wikimapia
FDNY - Engine 14 (New York City, New York)
USA / New Jersey / West New York / New York City, New York / East 18th Street, 14
3-story Beaux-Arts firehouse completed in 1895. Designed by N. LeBrun & Sons for the New York City Fire Department's Engine Company 14, It is clad in light brick with granite and terra-cotta trim, including a great deal of Italian Renaissance ornament. The ground-floor base is matte-faced light-colored granite with a polished water table. A square-headed surround contains a centrally-planned garage door, painted bright red. The door is inset behind a segmental-arched hood. The lintel reads "14 Engine 14" in raised type, flanked by scallop shells. To the east of the garage door is a window opening with a red-painted iron grille surmounted by a square opening with slats, and to the west is a bright-red wooden pedestrian door with windows and a transom surmounted by a square window. Surmounting these openings are friezes of colorful carved festoons, ribbons and paterae. The base is capped by a dentiled string course with fretwork.
The 2nd & 3rd floors, constructed of orange brick, are each pierced by one bay of three deep-set window openings. The 2nd-floor windows have a sill course, fluted stone surrounds, and a shared egg-and-dart lintel. Flanking stone facing is keyed to the brickwork. The spandrel between the second and third stories is embellished with two bronze medallions, inscribed with "A.D." at the east and "1894" at the west, and a dedication plaque at the center, bearing the names of the fire commissioners and Napoleon LeBrun & Sons, the firm which designed the building.
The 3rd-floor windows are framed at the ends by Ionic pilasters and at the center by two polished granite three-quarter Ionic columns from which an arcade springs. The windows are deeply set into square-headed openings topped by scalloped tympanums in the arches. The arcade is embellished with anthemion cresting, and an ornate entablature caps the facade, in which an iron frieze of festoons, crossed horns, and arabesques is surmounted by a cornice with scallop shells between the modillions, and lion's heads along the upper edge.
Nicknamed Sweet 14, Engine Company 14 was organized in 1865. It appears that the company was located at 15 East 18th Street until 1879, when it moved to its present location. Two stables that probably serve Engine Company 14 were formerly located at 10 and 12 East 18th Street.
14 East 18th Street firehouse:
wikimapia
FDNY - Engine 14 (New York City, New York)
USA / New Jersey / West New York / New York City, New York / East 18th Street, 14
3-story Beaux-Arts firehouse completed in 1895. Designed by N. LeBrun & Sons for the New York City Fire Department's Engine Company 14, It is clad in light brick with granite and terra-cotta trim, including a great deal of Italian Renaissance ornament. The ground-floor base is matte-faced light-colored granite with a polished water table. A square-headed surround contains a centrally-planned garage door, painted bright red. The door is inset behind a segmental-arched hood. The lintel reads "14 Engine 14" in raised type, flanked by scallop shells. To the east of the garage door is a window opening with a red-painted iron grille surmounted by a square opening with slats, and to the west is a bright-red wooden pedestrian door with windows and a transom surmounted by a square window. Surmounting these openings are friezes of colorful carved festoons, ribbons and paterae. The base is capped by a dentiled string course with fretwork.
The 2nd & 3rd floors, constructed of orange brick, are each pierced by one bay of three deep-set window openings. The 2nd-floor windows have a sill course, fluted stone surrounds, and a shared egg-and-dart lintel. Flanking stone facing is keyed to the brickwork. The spandrel between the second and third stories is embellished with two bronze medallions, inscribed with "A.D." at the east and "1894" at the west, and a dedication plaque at the center, bearing the names of the fire commissioners and Napoleon LeBrun & Sons, the firm which designed the building.
The 3rd-floor windows are framed at the ends by Ionic pilasters and at the center by two polished granite three-quarter Ionic columns from which an arcade springs. The windows are deeply set into square-headed openings topped by scalloped tympanums in the arches. The arcade is embellished with anthemion cresting, and an ornate entablature caps the facade, in which an iron frieze of festoons, crossed horns, and arabesques is surmounted by a cornice with scallop shells between the modillions, and lion's heads along the upper edge.
Nicknamed Sweet 14, Engine Company 14 was organized in 1865. It appears that the company was located at 15 East 18th Street until 1879, when it moved to its present location. Two stables that probably serve Engine Company 14 were formerly located at 10 and 12 East 18th Street.
FDNY - Engine 14 - Wikimapia
3-story Beaux-Arts firehouse completed in 1895. Designed by N. LeBrun & Sons for the New York City Fire Department's Engine Company 14, It is clad in light brick with granite and terra-cotta trim, including a great deal of Italian Renaissance ornament. The ground-floor base is matte-faced...
wikimapia.org
Engine 14 (continued):
14 East 18th Street firehouse:
Manhattan Sideways – Engine 14
It is impossible to miss Engine Co. 14 on a sunny afternoon. The ornate Beaux Arts design is simply eye-catching. Engine Co. 14 was erected in 1895 by architect Napoleon LeBrun, who was known for his decoratively designed fire stations. This style is typical of the earliest New York City firehouses. Today, Engine Co. 14 has been recognized as a historic landmark. For more than a century, firefighters have been working out of this building.
When my intern, Emily, walked past the fire station, the garage doors were wide open, and locals were wandering in and out to greet the friendly firefighters. One older veteran was smoking a cigar and chatting with a new member who had finished his training just six weeks ago. The two firefighters showed an eager little boy and his father into the front seat of their largest firetruck. The boy honked the loud horn, which all the firefighters exclaimed was “quite impressive” for someone his age.
http://sideways.nyc/2013/01/engine-co-14/
14 East 18th Street firehouse:
Manhattan Sideways – Engine 14
It is impossible to miss Engine Co. 14 on a sunny afternoon. The ornate Beaux Arts design is simply eye-catching. Engine Co. 14 was erected in 1895 by architect Napoleon LeBrun, who was known for his decoratively designed fire stations. This style is typical of the earliest New York City firehouses. Today, Engine Co. 14 has been recognized as a historic landmark. For more than a century, firefighters have been working out of this building.
When my intern, Emily, walked past the fire station, the garage doors were wide open, and locals were wandering in and out to greet the friendly firefighters. One older veteran was smoking a cigar and chatting with a new member who had finished his training just six weeks ago. The two firefighters showed an eager little boy and his father into the front seat of their largest firetruck. The boy honked the loud horn, which all the firefighters exclaimed was “quite impressive” for someone his age.
http://sideways.nyc/2013/01/engine-co-14/
Engine 14 (continued):
14 East 18th Street firehouse:
Designed by Napoleon LeBrun & Sons for the New York City Fire Department.
In 1879 Napoleon LeBrun became the official architect for the New York City Fire Department, which had formed in 1865. Between 1879 and 1895 the architectural firm would design 42 firehouses and other structures for the department, some of which still exist.
https://gvshp.org/blog/2019/01/02/napoleon-lebrun-firehouse-architect-and-so-much-more/
14 East 18th Street firehouse:
Designed by Napoleon LeBrun & Sons for the New York City Fire Department.
In 1879 Napoleon LeBrun became the official architect for the New York City Fire Department, which had formed in 1865. Between 1879 and 1895 the architectural firm would design 42 firehouses and other structures for the department, some of which still exist.
https://gvshp.org/blog/2019/01/02/napoleon-lebrun-firehouse-architect-and-so-much-more/