Le Brun's 1889 Hook & Ladder Co. 14 - 120 East 125th Street

 

image via the Historic Districts Council

In 1865, "suburban" fire companies were established in the mostly rural Harlem district.  Less busy than their urban counterparts, the fire fighters were given less pay and no horse-drawn equipment.  Included in these companies was Suburban Ladder No. 14 at 120 East 125th Street.

As Harlem developed, Suburban Ladder No. 14 was replaced by Hook & Ladder Company 14 on January 1, 1868.  Still using the station house on December 18, 1881, the New York Dispatch described the company as "one of the best truck companies in the upper part of the city.  It has good officers and men, the latter being under excellent discipline."  But in 1888, the company was in serious need of modern accommodations.

A year earlier, on June 18, 1887, The Real Estate Record & Guide commented that fire stations were an exception to the very few "decent-looking" buildings erected by the city.  "The Fire Department...had the good sense to employ architects of repute to design their buildings, and selected Messrs. N. Le Brun & Son for that purpose."  Napoleon Le Brun had been appointed official architect for the department in 1879.  Before the turn of the century he and his son would be responsible for the design of 42 fire houses.  

Napoleon Le Brun & Son filed plans for a "four-story brick building" on April 27, 1888, projecting the cost at $16,500--or about $576,000 in 2026.  Using a variation of its typical Queen Anne design, the firm added touches of Romanesque Revival in the undressed brownstone base, the medieval decoration carved into the second floor lintel, the rounded stone piers at the sides that terminated in carved finials, and the creative wrought-iron jib, or bracket, in the form of a dragon.  (The jib was used to haul hay bales to the attic.)  Le Brun & Son stepped away from both styles in designing the attic as a slate-shingled mansard in the Second Empire style.

Perhaps the first tragedy for Hook & Ladder Company 14 came on June 9, 1895.  Patrick Conlin had been with the company since 1883 when he was 25.  He was headed to work at 2:15 that afternoon when an alarm of fire at 165 East 112th Street came in.  The truck raced down Lexington Avenue "at full speed," as reported by The New York Times.  The article said, "he saw the truck going by and made a run to jump on the long rail which extends along the side of the truck."  Conlin slipped and fell.  The rear wheels "passed over Conlin's body, leaving him mangled and unconscious."  The 37-year-old died later that afternoon.

Rescues from burning buildings in the 19th century sometimes required dangerous, nearly gymnastic, tactics.  On September 29, 1896, Hook & Ladder Company 14 responded to a fire at 2365 Third Avenue.  When they arrived, the fire had engulfed the first floor and spread to the second.  Frederick Thompson, who occupied rooms on the fourth floor, had been asleep and was the only tenant not to escape.  Two firefighters, Thomas Corrigan and John Lutz, "saw his predicament and hastened to the rescue."

They went to the top floor of the the three-story building next door.  The Sun reported,  "Corrigan stood with one foot on the cornice of the house and reached with the other foot to the lintel of the third story of the burning house, at the same time grasping the sill of Thompson's window."  When he was certain of "the firmness of his grasp on the window sill," Corrigan threw his other arm around Thompson's waist and drew him across the void.  

Corrigan straddled the cornice and lintel of two buildings to rescue the victim.  The Sun, September 30, 1896 (copyright expired)

The Sun said, "When Lutz had taken Thompson in his grasp and drew him over on the roof a cheer went up from the crowd below, and the cheer was repeated when Corrigan climbed to the roof from his perilous position, and all three were safe."

The company's truck was pulled by three horses, the oldest of which was Paddy, who was always in the center.  The company acquired him in 1871 when he was six years old.  At the time of Corrigan's and Lutz's remarkable rescue, Paddy was "if not the oldest horse in the department, he was one of the oldest," said the New York Herald two years later.

Paddy had an unexpected best buddy, Chief, described by the newspaper as "a splendid greyhound."  In 1891, Chief was brought to the station house as a puppy.  The New York Herald said he "blundered" into Paddy's stall.  The firefighters were alarmed, expecting "to see him kicked or trampled."  Instead, "the big horse only put his head down inquiringly, and Chief licked his nose in token of good fellowship.  From that time the two were fast friends."  Every evening, Chief would bed down on the straw in a corner of Paddy's stall.  When an alarm would ring, Chief would bark, Paddy would whinny "with all the power of his throat" and the greyhound would race through the streets next to the galloping horses.

At 4:00 on the morning of August 19, 1897, Chief began wailing.  Some of the firefighters, said the New York Herald, "yelled at Chief and told him to be quiet, but he only clamored the louder."  Captain Terpeny send a man down to see what was wrong.  "That dog isn't carrying on that way for fun," he said.  And he was right.

The article said, "The big horse was very sick and his friend had been calling for help."  The FDNY's veterinarian diagnosed Paddy with cholic.  The New York Herald reported:

The horse became weaker and weaker, and finally fell down.  Chief stayed with him, licking his face and howling mournfully until the end, which was about 7 o'clock.  Then it was with great difficulty that the men got him out of the stall.

The newspaper concluded the article saying, "There is talk of giving the horse a ceremonial burial, with Chief as principal mourner."

via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

On February 1, 1907, the New-York Tribune reported that the station house of Hook & Ladder Company 14 would be receiving updates by architect Edward L. Middleton.  The renovations, costing the equivalent of more than $700,000 today, included "new concrete and iron floors...for the apparatus and the sliding pole floor opening enlarged."

The new floors had much to do with modern motorized equipment.  Hook & Ladder Company 14's speedy fire trucks greatly impressed Walter J. Albert in 1922.  On the night of May 1 that year he made "a little wager" with two friends, as described by the New-York Tribune.  He bet them that Engine 14 "could get from its house at 120 East 125th Street to the [alarm] box at 133d Street and Madison Avenue in three minutes."  The friends took the bet and Albert pulled the alarm.

The newspaper said, "When Albert was caught near the box at 133d Street the firemen were in a mood to cripple him.  It was the third time they had been called out on false alarms."  The article said that Patrolman Patrick Cushen, who caught Albert, "had to protect him from the irate fireman."

At the station house, Albert confessed that he was betting on the speed of the fire engine.

"Did you win?" asked one of the detectives.

"Naw, they were two minutes slow."

By the second half of the 20th century, the personality of the congested Harlem neighborhood around the firehouse had greatly changed.  City employees like policemen and firefighters were often viewed with suspicion and derision.  At around 2:00 on the morning of December 27, 1961, Hook & Ladder Company 14's truck was passing a crowd outside a bar at Park Avenue and 123rd Street.  Suddenly a bottle smashed against the side of the fire truck.  The New York Times reported that the truck stopped "and a fight ensued."

The article said, "The street fight was broken up by an unidentified railroad detective.  He drew his pistol and forced back the crowd as it pummeled the firemen."  In the end, four fire fighters and one civilian were injured.  

In 1975, Hook & Ladder Company 14 was relocated to 2282 Third Avenue.  Its former firehouse was officially decommissioned in 2003.  Napoleon Le Brun & Son's striking firehouse sat vacant and neglected for years.  Then, on August 31, 2014, The Real Deal reported, "An abandoned 19th-century firehouse in East Harlem is getting a new lease on life as a cultural center."

Six years earlier, Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito had saved the structure from the auction block by promising that it would be repurposed as a cultural center.  The Real Deal reported, "Now the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute has been selected as the building's developer."  The Daily News reported that the organization would spent $5.5 million on restoration and renovations to the building.

photograph by Steven Bornholtz

Today, the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute's website explained that it "preserves and presents African Diaspora cultures, promoting arts and culture as tools for personal transformation, community-building, and social justice."

N. Le Brun & Son's 1881 Engine Company 44 - 221 East 75th Street

Easily cleaned away, a century of grime currently obscures the contrast of red brick and brownstone trim.

As the city recovered from the Financial Panic of 1873, development on the Upper East Side began in earnest.    The burgeoning popular required additional police stations, schools and fire stations.  The city scrambled to keep up, as did Napoleon Le Brun, who had become the official architect of the New York City Fire Department in 1879.

On November 17 that year the city paid Israel Caspar and his wife, Henrietta, $3,500 (around $91,000 today) for the 25-foot wide midblock lot at No. 121 East 76th Street, between Second and Third Avenues.  By September 17, 1880, when plans were filed for a new firehouse, Le Brun's son Pierre had joined him in the business, creating N. Le Brun & Son.  The plans were vague, calling for a "three-story brick engine house."  Construction was projected to cost $15,000; bringing the total cost to about $471,000 in today's dollars.

While some of N. Le Brun & Son's later firehouses would border on the opulent, this would be more outwardly utilitarian (quite possibly because of the architects' astounding workload at the time).  The firm followed the typical firehouse pattern--the cast iron base was dominated by the centered, two-door truck bay flanked by a doorway and window.  The upper floors were clad in red brick and trimmed in brownstone.  A wide opening at the second floor allowed hay and other supplies to be hoisted up.  A handsome pressed copper cornice crowned the structure.

It was almost assuredly the number of station houses the firm was tasked with designing that led N. Le Brun & Son to essentially recycle this design the following year.  Engine Company 27, at No. 173 Franklin Street, and Engine Company 13 at No. 99 Wooster Street, completed in 1881, were near twins; and their cast iron bases and copper cornices were identical.

Engine Company 27 (above) and Engine Company 13 completed a year later, were near copies of No. 44.

The station house became home to the newly-formed Engine Company 44.  Its members would deal with fires caused by circumstances common to the period and the district--gas lighting, open flames, wooden structures, and poorly designed tenement buildings.

But the cause of the fire that broke out on the day before Independence Day in 1884 was unique.  At around noon Captain Rodger B. Hamblett heard "a loud report, followed by a rattle as of the discharge of small arms," as described by the New York Herald.  Just down the street was Public School No. 70 and the children of the primary department who had just been released for the day filled the sidewalks.

Hamblett rushed out of the firehouse to discover that the fireworks display in the show window of Helen Masterson's variety store directly next door were exploding, sparking a fire.  The engine was brought out and the flames extinguished.  The school children seem to have delighted in the show, unaware of the danger.  They "were pouring out of the school doors, but fortunately they did not take flight and therefore there was no panic among them," said the New York Herald.  The article presumed that the fireworks were detonated by "the focusing of the sun's rays by the plate glass windows of the store."

The company responded to a much more perilous call on May 11, 1900.  The five-story tenement house at No. 176 East 78th Street caught fire when escaping gas from equipment in the basement, used for pumping water to the upper floors, exploded.  The basement level was filled with toxic gas and smoke and one by one the firefighters who went down were overwhelmed.

The New-York Tribune reported "Nearly ever member of Engine Company No. 44 was overcome."  It began when the first three, Lieutenant Taylor and Firemen Jeremiah Driscoll and Jeremiah Blazzine lost consciousness.  They were carried out, but their rescuers then collapsed.  Although some of the men were unconscious for up to ten minutes, each rushed back into the fire as they recovered.  

"Fire Chaplain Johnson was kept busy working over the men and bringing them back to consciousness," said the article.  Three men, Firemen Connolley and Morie and Captain Hicks "were repeatedly overcome and left the cellar many times, but returned as soon as they revived."  Although Hicks was in serious condition, according to the newspaper, he refused to be taken to the hospital until the blaze was extinguished.

The iconic mascot of fire companies was the Dalmatian.   And Engine Company 44 adopted theirs, Fritz, in 1903.  Four years later, in June 1907, a reporter from the New-York Tribune visited the station house to learn about the activities of the fire dog.

Fireman Ehrhardt explained, "You'd be surprised how clever that dog is.  He's right on hand the minute the alarm sounds, and he never stays away from a fire, not he!  And he goes right into the burning buildings, too, with the men, into the basements and the cellars, right into the hot steam.  He's got a burn on his foot now from the steam."

Ehrhardt claimed that no matter how many horses and men were at a fire, "it may be a third alarm or a fourth alarm fire," Fritz never was confused, always recognizing his own firefighters and horses.

Photographed in 1930, Engine Company 44 (to the right) sat on a bustling street.  P.S. 70 is in the foreground.  None of the structures in the photograph, other than the fire station, survive.  photograph from the collection of the New York Public Library

With a public school steps away, Fritz was understandably a popular attraction to the children.  They were devastated, as were the firefighters, when he died on March 17, 1913.  The Evening World reported "Old age carried off Fritz, who had been with the company ten years."  The newspaper called him "the oldest and smartest dog mascot in the Fire Department."

The article recalled "During his career as a fire dog he had his feet blistered on hot roofs, his coat marred by hot cinders and sparks.  No fire was too hot to deter Fritz from entering a building with the firemen."   The body of the Dalmatian was laid in state in the firehouse, wearing "a fireman's full dress coat and a service helmet."  The Evening World said "hundreds of school children visited the place and took a last look at the firehouse mascot."  The following morning his casket was interred in the dog cemetery in Scarsdale.  "Later a monument will be erected over the grave," said the article.

His replacement, Fritz III, soon arrived.  (Fritz II, a foundling pup, was a temporary tenant during Fritz's lifetime.  He had been given to another firehouse.)  The Evening World called the new mascot "a fine Dalmatian dog."  But on January 26, 1914 that newspaper began an article saying "The firemen of Engine Company No. 44 at No. 221 East Seventy-fifth street are sad to-day."  When the fire alarm rang early that morning, Fritz jumped to action.  But "in his haste to reach the engine from the second floor he slipped and fell, fracturing his pelvis."

Dr. L. Greissman, a veterinarian, worked two hours over Fritz, encasing his rear body in a plaster cast.  The vet predicted after being in the cast three weeks the dog "will be perfectly cured."  During that time, Greissman would make daily visits to the firehouse.

In the meantime the firefighters of Engine Company 44 repeatedly faced peril.  Gas was again the culprit in a near-deadly situation in the basement of a tenement fire on July 17, 1909.  The Sun explained "The heat from the fire had melted the solder on the meter connections and gas was flowing all over the place."  The article continued "Firemen continued to go into the cellar to find a cutoff, and after an hour's work the entire companies of Engines 44 and 13 were stretched out on the street from gas poisoning."

A particularly tragic fire broke out in a tenement house on Second Avenue on the night of January 25, 1910.  The building had been recently remodeled, resulting in what the Fire Department called a "death trap," including an S-shaped hallway at the top of the first flight of stairs.

One of the panicked residents who struggled to escape the burning building, was Lena Labarbera, an Italian immigrant.  She scooped up her three-year old cousin, Philomena Alesia and headed down the flame engulfed stairway.  Just as she reached the second floor she stumbled and dropped the child.  The burning banister gave way and Lena fell to the ground floor.

Terribly burned, the firefighters pulled her out.  She screamed desperately trying to tell the men about the toddler inside, but none of them spoke Italian.  She was taken to the Presbyterian Hospital and it was not until the fire was extinguished that the body of little Philomena was discovered.

There was almost another fatality in that fire.  Engine Company 44's Captain Eugene McLoughlin lost his way in the dark and twisting second floor hallway.  Like Lena Labarbera, he crashed to the ground floor, but recovered.

Fire engines were pulled by especially large and powerful horses.   As they galloped at full speed to fires pedestrians and vehicle drivers were fully aware of the dangers; yet there were occasional accidents.  The engine had only traveled half a block from the firehouse on the night of December 18, 1909 when tragedy occurred.  At the corner of 75th Street and Second Avenue 50-year old John Rogers thought he could make it across the intersection.  The Sun explained that the man "got in its path while trying to cross the street and Driver Christopher Bruton could not rein in his horses in time."  The man died at the Presbyterian Hospital later that night.

A somewhat macabre accident occurred on November 17, 1913 when Engine Company 44 responded to a multiple alarm fire in the Chelsea Hotel on West 23rd Street.  Directly across the street was an undertaker's shop.  As the tender of Engine Company 44 galloped to the scene, professional pallbearers were carrying the body of Frank Harris to the hearse.  The New-York Tribune reported "While the fire was moving along favorably, the tender of Engine Company 44, trying to find room to settle, slapped" the hearse.   The plan was to take the casket to a train, to be transported back to Toronto, Canada.  But "the hearse was so damaged that the transfer to a railroad station had to be postponed," said the article.

The men of Engine Company 44 continued to show their bravery throughout the decades, too often paying the ultimate price.  In January 1919 George Scanlon had had the cushy job of chauffeur for Deputy Fire Chief Thomas J. Hayes for seven years.  But on January 13 he requested to be transferred to Engine Company 44.  Almost simultaneously probationary fireman Joseph Schmidt arrived at the firehouse.  Seven days later both were dead after a wall collapsed at afire on East 104th Street.

Fireman Joseph Flanigan went into the cellar of No. 1158 First Avenue during a blaze on July 31, 1921.  As had been the case so many times earlier, firefighters were overcome by gas and smoke.  But this time the 34-year old Flanigan would not survive.  His body was found at the foot of a stairway in the cellar.

Multiple-alarm fires sometimes took Engine Company 44 far away from its station house.  On December 16, 1931 the men responded to a highly dangerous situation in a paint factory on Washington Street.  The barrels of oil and paint inside continually exploded over a period of three hours.  That perilous situation was augmented by the toxic gases being released.

The Sun reported that six firefighters were injured, and "All but one of the firemen overcome were able to return to duty.  Lieut. John Matthies of Engine Company 44, who collapsed in the street, was sent to Beekman Street Hospital."

Neighbors and firefighters alike were disappointed and disillusioned when the city ordered half a dozen fire houses closed in 1975--including Engine Company 44.  But after transferring some of the men and laying off others, the city reversed its decision, reopening the station on Independence Day.

The New York Times began an article on July 5 saying "As holidays go, it was fairly quiet yesterday for Engine Company 44 on East 75th Street, with Sparky, the Dalmatian mascot, sunning himself on the sidewalk and half a dozen fire calls by late afternoon--mostly burning rubbish.  But it certainly was not business as usual."

The men of Company 44 had hung a sheet from the facade saying "Thanks Everybody" in large hand-painted letters.  The Times said "Neighbors dropped by all day to shake hands and say, 'Welcome back.'"

Firefighter Michael J. Lyons typified the valor of the company when it responded to a fire in a reputed crack house in Harlem on March 10, 1996.   Lyons was directed to search for a missing woman and the thick smoke and fire required him to do so on his hands and knees in a fifth-floor hallway.

He later recalled "To my right there was a room.  I saw what looked like the back of an ankle.  It was right in front of my face.  It turned out to be a lady.  She was face down in the corner."

Lyons and two others pulled the unconscious 70-year-old to a stairwell landing and tried to resuscitate her.  She was removed in critical condition to the burn unit of Jacobi Medical Center.

Michael J. Lyons's last act of bravery came on September 11, 2001.   Killed in the World Trade Center attack, he left a 17-month old daughter and an another, still unborn.

After nearly 140 years in its red brick firehouse, Engine Company 44 continues to operate here.  Showing the expected modernization necessary for a modern fire house, it nonetheless is a reminder of the time when the neighborhood was just developing and horse-drawn fire engines protected it.

photograph by the author

The 1856 Columbian Hook & Ladder Firehouse - 102 Charles Street

In 1854 volunteer companies made up Manhattan's fire fighting force.  Their members, who all had other jobs, lived near their firehouses.  Called "laddies," they scrambled to the station on alarm of fire.  That year a new group, Columbian Hook and Ladder Company No. 14 was organized in Greenwich Village.   

The property at No. 96 Charles Street, nearby the new police station at No. 100, was deemed a good location for its firehouse.  In June 1855 a Board of Aldermen report recommended the property as the new firehouse.  It was owned by Samuel D. Chase who lived nearby on West 11th Street.  Only months earlier he had completed a house on the the site with a stable in the rear. 

If the need for a new fire company in the immediate neighborhood was ever in doubt, a fire one month after the Aldermen's report may have eliminated the question.  Ironically, the blaze which broke out around 2:00 on the afternoon of July 16 was in the stable behind No. 96 Charles Street.  It caused damages of about $100--nearly $3,000 today.

This would not be the first time the city's architect was tasked with converting a residence into a firehouse.  In 1854 an upscale home at No. 269 Henry Street was transformed for Americus Engine Company No. 6.  The Charles Street house, too, would emerge as a handsome firehouse.  

The renovations were completed in 1857.  As was typical, large, centered bay doors were flanked by entrances.  The arched stone pediment over the bay doors was echoed above the upper windows.  An understated sheet-metal cornice crowned the design.

The ground floor held the company's brand new truck, constructed by Pine & Hartshorn in 1856, and its team of sturdy horses.  The second floor held a dormitory, a library, and a "grand meeting room and parlor."   The top floor housed equipment including racks for drying hoses, for instance, and a "trunk room."

Members of the Columbian Hook and Ladder Company, No. 14 represented a wide variety of mostly blue collar jobs.  The 1857 roster includes clerks, cartmen, three ice dealers, several carpenters, two painters, a locksmith, a bookbinder and a grocer.  There were also one silversmith and a jeweler in the group.  The "laddies" came and went as their schedules demanded; but one member, Peter W. Fraleigh, lived here full-time.

A few weeks after the Civil War broke out Colonel Elmer E. Ellsworth, a personal friend of Abraham Lincoln, organized the 11th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment, composed entirely of fire fighters.  Several of the member of Columbian Hook and Ladder Company, No. 14 joined the unit known popularly as the Fire Zuoaves.

The group quickly saw action, winning a battle in May 1861 almost immediately upon arriving in the South.  The enemy's flag was sent home.  On June 1 The New York Times reported "The first Confederate flag taken in Virginia by the Fire Zuoaves, will be hoisted, union down, under the Stars and Stripes, on Sunday morning, at 10 o'clock, on the house of No. 14 Hook and Ladder Company, at No. 96 Charles-street."

The firefighter soldiers would return home to a changing fire department.  The Act of 1865, enacted on March 30, coupled Brooklyn and New York with a paid “Metropolitan District” fire department.  The volunteer companies were disbanded and No. 96 Charles Street became home to the new Hook and Ladder Company No. 5.

The unit's importance in squashing the many fires in the district was evidenced in January 1884 when the Fire Commissioners decided to "double up" Hook and Ladder Company No. 5 by providing an additional truck and "a sufficient additional force...to man the reserve apparatus."

Most fire houses acquired a mascot and Hook and Ladder Company No. 5 adopted Ginger in 1882.  The New York Times described him as "a nondescript dog, pedigree unknown."  The mutt was a favorite among neighborhood girls who "stopped at the truckhouse on their way to and from school for a romp with 'Ginger.'"  But Ginger was more than a playmate, he was a true fire house dog.

"Ginger was essentially a fireman's dog and took an almost human interest in the affairs of the company.  He was prompt to answer alarms of fire, and when the truck rolled out of the quarters his short, sharp bark mingled with the gong's louder tones as he ran at the head of the horses," wrote The Times.

But then, on November 17, 1888, 16 years after the dog first arrived at the firehouse, The New York Times ran the headline "Ginger Is No More."  Ginger was "taking his constitutional walk in Bleecker-street," the day before when he was run over by a truck.  A policeman, recognizing that the dog's wounds were fatal, ended its misery by shooting it in the head.

Ginger's body was laid out with dignity in the side yard of the firehouse.  "When his death became known yesterday to the school children they thronged to the truckhouse for a last look at their pet."  He was buried there the following day.

Possibly, Ginger's unmarked grave still exists in the adjoining yard.

The galloping horses pulling the heavy fire equipment presented a danger to vehicles and pedestrians despite the loud gongs of the trucks' bells.  When a fire erupted at No. 8 West 13th Street on the afternoon of November 18, 1901 Hook and Ladder Company No. 5 responded.  Mrs. Mary Smith, a missionary of the Church of the Strangers, stepped into the street directly in the path of the charging fire truck.

The Evening World reported that the driver "tried to save her" by veering the truck; "but the horses knocked her down."  The fire truck then ran directly into a street car.  Hook and Ladder Company No. 5 never made it to the fire and Mary Smith was removed to St. Vincent's Hospital.

The company appeared in the press most often, however, for the heroics of its members.  Such was the case on March 9, 1921 when fire tore through the apartment of J. W. Ferrington at No. 249 West 11th Street.   Ferrington was an invalid, unable to get out of his smoke-filled rooms.

Fire fighters broke in the door to find that "flames were sweeping across the rooms," according to The Evening World.  Fireman Hogan dropped to his hands and knees and felt his way through the apartment.  Other fire fighters aimed their hose directly on him.  "The only possible manner by which he could penetrate the flames and smoke was by the protection of streams of water constantly played upon him, and in this manner he went from room to room."

Hogan finally found Ferrington, who had managed to tumble out of the bed.  He was crouching by a window, trying to breathe.  The newspaper reported that Hogan "dragged him to the hallway, the water drenching both throughout their progress."

In the meantime, the fire spread to two apartments on the floor above.  Mrs. Simon J. Medico was visiting with her 8-month-old son, Simon, Jr. on the fifth floor.  She "became hysterical when she found her way blocked by smoke and screamed from a window."   She managed to climb part way down the fire escape and pass her baby to a neighbor in an adjacent building.

The fire also extended into the apartment of Daniel J. Phelan, whose 16-year-old son, Edward, rushed upstairs after the blaze was extinguished.  The Evening World explained he needed "to assure himself of the safety of two pet canaries and his first long trousers.  The smoke had killed the canaries, and the flames had burned the legs off the trousers."

In 1936 the Charles Street block was renumbered, assigning the firehouse the new address of No. 102.

A five-alarm blaze on June 20, 1942 wrecked nearly the entire Greenwich Village block bordered by Hudson, Washington, Leroy and Clarkson Streets.  The inferno resulted in 50 injuries to fire fighters, $15 million in damages by today's standards, and the total loss of Hook and Ladder Company No. 5's truck.

At one point, according to The New York Times, "The north wall crashed with a tearing, crunching sound and a barrage of flying bricks...Hook and Ladder Truck 5, stationed at 102 Charles Street, and accordingly one of the first pieces of apparatus to respond, fared worse than any of the men."  The truck had been pulled "close in" on Leroy Street.  When the wall smashed down, it flattened the fire truck.  Amazingly, warned by a large crack that appeared in the masonry, all of the fire fighters escaped.

Fire fighters clamber over the wreckage of Company 5's truck.  The New York Times June 21, 1942

As had been the case in the 1880's, Hook and Ladder Company 5 had a mascot.  This one, named Prince, was no mutt like Ginger, however.  He was a pedigree Dalmatian--the iconic fire house breed.

The men of Company 5 held their dog in such high esteem that they entered him in the special fire dog category in Brooklyn Kennel Club Dog Show on December 3, 1949.  A month earlier, on November 24, The Times reported "Firemen are stealing a little time from polishing brass these days to groom their Dalmatians for the special competition."

Fire Chief Joseph J. Scanlon tried to discourage the practice of fire dogs, telling a Times reported "Officially, the department has no interest in dogs," adding "A firehouse is no longer a good place for a dog in these high-powered, mechanized days.  They may fall off the speeding trucks answering an alarm, or get run over or they sometimes get lost in the crowded city.  The average life of a firehouse dog is not much more than one year today, I'd guess."

The cold water the chief threw on the event did not discourage the men of Hook and Ladder Company No. 5.  Prince was shown at the show by Fireman Leonard Smith.  Because it was a special category, no award was given.

Prince is groomed by Company 5 fire fighters before the show.  The New York Times, November 24, 1949

It was cats which caused problems to the fire fighters 11 years later.  In the fall of 1960, unknown to the men, two feral cats took up residence in the basement.  One had a litter of kittens there.  They were not the only new residents.

On September 11 the men began scratching.  One by one they showed signs of bites until, as reported by The New York Times, "After two days of scratching, the company captain, Benjamin J. Ciranna, complained to Battalion Chief Cornelius P. Harrington."  Chiefs Harrington and Otto H. Knochenhauer went to the firehouse to investigate.  They were promptly bitten.

A Fire Department spokesman said "investigation proved the invaders were not gnats or mosquitoes but straight out-and-out fleas--the dog type."  The firehouse was vacated.  The Times quipped "The twenty-five officers and firemen of Ladder Company 5, victors over raging holocausts, collapsing walls and barricades of beams, have been forced to retreat before an ignoble enemy--an army of fleas."

The truck and its men were temporarily lodged at Engine Company 24 at No. 78 Morton Street.  Pioneer Exterminating Company spent three days in the firehouse, fumigating it with a "machine vaporizer."  The firefighters returned home on September 16.

The 136-year history of No. 102 Charles Street as a firehouse came to an end in 1993.  A renovation, completed the following year resulted in a store at street level and one apartment each on the upper floors.

For years the ground floor, formerly home to horses and then motorized fire trucks, held the Plane Space art gallery.  It houses an upscale handbags and accessories boutique today.

photographs by the author