Mack,
I know of that 1949 article in WNYF, but it was incorrect. The Fire Patrol did not respond to ALL boxes in the Bronx on the first alarm, north and east of the Bronx River..
They went only on boxes for commercial properties. All first alarms maybe in Mott Haven, Melrose, and Morrisiania. Outside of those areas, they went on the 3d alarm, unless special called.
If you saw the Fire Patrol rolling up Webster or Third Avenues in those days, you knew you had a good taxpayer going, or a factory somewhere up the line.
True story. In June of 2008, a commercial building at Box 3370, Fordham and Webster, went to an All Hands, and then a second alarm. The Chief of the 7th Division requested the Fire patrol to respond. The dispatcher had to inform him that the Fire Patrol had been disbanded 7 months before.