FIRE ALARM

"This 14 x 20 metal sign hung for many years in front of the Paterson, New Jersey Fire Alarm Telegraph Office," according to an article in the April 1988 edition of Crown Jewels of the Wire, a magazine for collectors of glass and porcelain insulators used by telegraph, telephone and electric wires.

PATERSON ENGINE 12

The Paterson Fire Journal received this photo of Engine 12's crew - circa 1930s or 1940s - from Bridget Westhoven. She writes: "I wish I had more background on this photo. It belonged to Edward (Eddie) Westhoven. Notation on the back indicates that these men were all members of Engine Company 12 (Paterson). Left to right: Bill McKelney, Ernie Wildermuth, Edward Westhoven and Howard Probert.''

GREAT FALLS - 1983

Photo: patersongreatfalls.org

Ruins of Allied Textile Co. two decades after the fire

In 1983, Paterson's Great Falls Historic District was the scene of two general alarms fires - just weeks apart.

On June 24 of that year, Box 176 was transmitted at 3:55 a.m. for the Allied Textile Co. mill at 1 Van Houten St. Ten or more firefighters suffered minor injuries at the blaze.

The same box was struck on May 29, 1983 for a factory at 21 Market St. That alarm was received at 4:06 a.m, according to the book ``Taking the Heat,'' a history of the Paterson Fire Department published in 1985.

FAMILY LOST - 1975

Hartford Courant, March 29, 1975

PATERSON, N.J. (AP) -- Three children and their grandmother, who authorities say were just yards away from safety, have died in an apartment fire here.

Editor's Note: Your editor was a teenage volunteer at the Greater Paterson General Hospital in Wayne when one or two of the fire victims, covered in soot, arrived at the emergency room in cardiac arrest. I remember that one of the firemen was still donned in his turnout gear at the hospital. The emergency room smelled of smoke. As I recall hearing it, some of the victims sought refuge under a bed.

CHAPLAIN MOURNED

Photo: West Paterson Fire Dept. web site

Rev. John Piccione, firemen's chaplain
Tuesday, February 24, 2009

By JAY LEVIN
NorthJersey.com

The Rev. John T. Piccione, the Paterson Fire Department's revered Catholic chaplain, died Sunday. He was 44 and known around city firehouses as "the padre."

He had leukemia, said his order, the Franciscan Friars of Holy Name Province.

"Whether at 2 in the afternoon or 2 in the morning, 80 degrees or 8 degrees, he was there with us," said Deputy Fire Chief Joseph A. Murray.

Sometimes Father Piccione showed up in his brown robe. Sometimes he showed up in street clothes. But he always showed up — to minister to first responders at emergency scenes, to offer counseling and to preside at weddings, baptisms and funerals.

Sometimes he visited firehouses just to watch a ballgame with the guys.

"Everything a priest does in his own parish, he did for us, and then some," Murray said. "I once called Father John and got him while he was at a cardiologist's office waiting to take a stress test. He said, 'I'll be there in five minutes.'

"We are never going to fill his shoes."

Father Piccione, also chaplain for the West Paterson Volunteer Fire Department and Passaic County Prosecutor's Office, was known to fire and police agencies throughout Passaic and Bergen counties. When Fair Lawn Police Officer Mary Ann Collura was gunned down in the line of duty in 2003, it was Father Piccione who went to St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center to bless her body, Murray said.

Father Piccione was introduced to fire chaplaincy by the Rev. Mychal Judge, a fellow Franciscan who was the New York City Fire Department chaplain.

Judge's death on 9/11 — he was giving last rites to a fireman at the World Trade Center when he was struck by falling debris — deeply affected Father Piccione.

"He'd take me along, and he told me if I had any chance to become a fire chaplain, I should do it," Father Piccione said of Judge in 2003.

PASSAIC LABOR DAY - 1985

UPDATED SEPT. 2016 & JULY 2021

Photos: Passaic Fire Dept. 

On Labor Day 1985, fire leveled 18 factories and 23 homes in the City of Passaic and led to the death of a mutual aid firefighter.

The disaster crippled the local economy, destroying businesses and putting more than 2,000 people out of work.

Police arrested two boys, ages 12 and 13, for starting the the blaze at the Gera Mills Industrial Park on Sept. 2, 1985.

''They have admitted to setting the fire,'' Passaic Mayor Joseph Lipari said at a news conference at City Hall. ''They stated they were playing with matches.''

Passaic firefighters were crippled by a lack of water, staffing shortages and antiquated radio communications and relied on mutual aid from from across North Jersey.

A member of the Secaucus Fire Department, William Koenemund, 65, suffered a fatal heart attack.

Koenemund, described as "100% fireman" by a chief officer, was working the ladders when he took ill, the Hudson Reporter said.

Eleven other firefighters were injured.

Stephen Geosits III, a rookie firefighter at the time, recalled "an old-timer firefighter saying to me, 'Hey, kid, take a look at this, 'cause you're never going to see this again.' "

In a story marking the 25th anniversary of the disaster, NorthJersey.com said:

Investigators traced the fire's source to an alleyway between two six-story factories at 122 and 130 Eighth St., where two boys tossed matches into a refuse bin containing naphthalene, a highly flammable chemical used to make mothballs. Once lit, the fire spread rapidly between buildings and from one side of the street to the other.

Fueled by chemicals stored in some of the Eighth Street factories, the fire spread quickly, consuming six industrial buildings. Low water pressure from hydrants and a strong wind compounded firefighters' troubles extinguishing the blaze on the particularly warm day. More than 100 hydrants in the area had been shut to prevent people from opening them to cool off during the summer.

In addition, a 100,000-gallon water tank that fed firefighting appliances had sat empty and inoperable for at least two years before the fire.

In all, 300 firefighters from 39 departments worked for 12 hours to control the blaze, which smoldered for weeks.

Products that burned included paints, chemicals, solvents, postage stamps, vinyl wall coverings, cardboard boxes, yarn, handkerchiefs and polyester cloth, The New York Times reported, as well as costumes stored in a warehouse for the New York City Opera.

OLD GOOSENECK

Photo: www.firehistory.org

Hand-pumped fire engine that served Paterson in early 1800s.

PASSAIC'S DEATH CAR - 1914

TWO HURT IN "DEATH CAR."

Passaic Fire Auto, Which Once Killed Two Men, Again Upsets.

Special to The New York Times.

PASSAIC, N. J., Nov. 21.---Racing along Erie Street at a high rate of speed today, Engine Six, an automobile fire engine, turned turtle near Lafayette Avenue. John Farrell and John Ackerman, fireman, were badly injured. Both are at St. Mary's Hospital suffering with bruises and internal injuries. Farell's legs are broken. The big auto is almost a total wreck.

This is the same auto in which Charles Cowley, then Secretary of the Passaic Board of Education, and Lieutenant James J. Delaney were killed five years ago when it ran into an iron telephone pole. Since then it has been known as "the car of death, " and many firemen have refused to ride in it.

The New York Times - Nov. 22, 1914

DISASTER AVERTED

TIME MAGAZINE
Monday, May. 15, 1933

HEROES:
Six Orphans

Early one evening last week a heavy rainstorm drenched New Jersey. At the Passaic Home & Orphan Asylum, six boys - Jacob Merlnizek, John Murdock, Douglas Fleming, Rudolph Borsche' Frank & Michael Mazzola, all between 11 and 15 - were worried.

Maybe their baseball field was washing away. They cunningly approached their matron. Didn't she want to know if the rain had damaged her garden? She did. She said they might go out if they were careful to put on raincoats and rubbers.

A quick look at the garden showed that it was all right. Closer inspection of the baseball diamond, where they played with worn-out canvas gloves and three damaged bats, was equally reassuring. Then the boys saw something else. A washout had completely carried away the ballast from under a section of track on the nearby Erie R. R. right-of-way!

Aware that an 8:10 commuting train was soon due, the boys pulled off their raincoats, ran down the track waving them wildly. The engineer said that if the boys had not been spry they would have been killed as he jerked his train to a stop, saving the lives of 500 passengers.

The grateful Erie promised a handsome award to the young Passaic heroes. The Mayor & Commissioners of Passaic planned to strike medals in their honor. Photographers and reporters flocked to the asylum. Was there anything they particularly wanted done? Yes. said the boys. Just make sure Babe Ruth heard about them.

Following Saturday, Passaic's small heroes met some of their big heroes at the circus in Manhattan. Clyde Beatty. tamer of lions and tigers, shook their hands and gave autographs. Hugo Zacchini, the human cannonball, greeted them. Gene Tunney came over to say hello. Max Schmeling invited them to his training camp at Oak Ridge, N. J. Babe Ruth, who sent each boy a telegram, will have them up to the Yankee Stadium soon, promises to try and knock a home-run in their honor.

CAPTAIN MCGUIRE

One of Paterson's most decorated firefighters, Captain Elliot McGuire, died Nov. 29 after a brief fight with pancreatic cancer, according to the web site NorthJersey.com.

McGuire, who was 66, thrived under pressure and dangerous conditions, according to colleagues.

During his 34-year career, McGuire received commendations for lifesaving, including a 1993 blaze in which he directed firefighters to evacuate a house before it was swept by flames.

"Elliot was a fireman's fireman," said Captain Mike Barr, quoted by NorthJersey.com. "He had the knowledge. He had experience and he inspired guys by just going to fires with him.''

McGuire was promoted to captain in 1992, and worked at Engine Co. 2 in the Riverside and Ladder Co. 1 at fire headquarters, according to the web site.

In 1989, McGuire rescued a child from a fire on Godwin Avenue and revived the 7-year-old victim with CPR. In 1981, he helped rescue five people from a Park Avenue fire.

The save most remembered, though, was the 1993 house fire on East 23rd Street. Captain Mike D'Arco, one of the firefighters to escape, said: ``I used to call him my savior."

CHIEF MADAMA

From NorthJersey.com

A Life: Sal Madama, 1911-2008
Sunday, October 19, 2008

Sal Madama retired from firefighting in 1976. Or did he?

Well into his 90s, Mr. Madama showed fellow residents of St. Joseph's Home for the Elderly in Totowa how to use the extinguisher.

He spent Thursday evenings at local firehouses — "chewing the rag," as his wife, Mary Ann, put it, but also sharing his vast knowledge with far younger colleagues.

Once a fireman, always a fireman. And Mr. Madama, who died Tuesday at 97, had as legendary a career as any.

He joined his hometown Paterson Fire Department in 1939. He was 27, and adrift.

"I had no desire for nothing," Mr. Madama once recalled. "I took the fire test because my friend took it, and I came out 22nd."

Over the next 36 years, he held every position of consequence in the department, all the way up to chief. On his own, Mr. Madama — who had college degrees in public safety and public administration — conducted classes for small-town volunteer firefighters throughout North Jersey.

His mantras were "discipline" and "training."

"Discipline and training go hand in hand," he told volunteers in Denville, according to a 1967 story in the Paterson Morning Call. "Without discipline, line officers cannot carry out orders of the chief. It must be second nature to respond to orders."

As his career was winding down, Mr. Madama became the fire chief in Laconia, N.H. He retired after a year and returned to New Jersey, continuing to teach fire science at the community college level.

HALEDON

Vintage photo of Haledon Fire Company No. 1

Paterson ladder company (left) at Haledon fire

PATERSON'S FAREWELL TO HORSES

Central fire station, 115 Van Houten St., opened March 19, 1912 as quarters of Engine Co. 1 and Engine Co. 5. Later that year, Truck Co. 2 moved in. In 1982, it was replaced by the Madison Avenue station, on former site of Paterson General Hospital.

Edison Monthly
January 1921

A COMPLETELY motorized fire department — the largest in the state and one of the first in the country — is the source of a great deal of pride on the part of the citizens of Paterson, New Jersey.

Additional interest is due to the fact that the motorization was accomplished through the conversion of horse-drawn trucks to automobiles, and further, that the apparatus is electrically driven.

As a result of the changes Paterson now has speedy and dependable fire equipment, economy of operation is assured, because electrics can be operated at a lower cost than any other type; and because it was possible to convert horse vehicle into motors, the city avoided the waste of scrapping apparatus which though old, was still good for many years of service.

The importance of adequate fire protection for a city of the industrial importance of this silk manufacturing center, with its great mill districts, its large foreign population, its many hilly streets, and a residential district where the houses are, as a rule, of frame construction, need hardly be commented upon.

The Paterson Fire Department consists of fifteen companies and the electric apparatus includes nine engines, ten combination wagons, and three ladder trucks.

Central Fire Station

These are stationed at strategic points throughout the city and the headquarters building is on Van Houten Street.

The garage and repair shop of the department are on the ground floor of this building. Executive offices. dormitories, a social hall, and handball courts are on the upper floors.

The headquarters building was erected after the installation of automobiles was decided upon and consequently was designed especially to provide garage facilities.

The other buildings, however, were remodeled, the changes from stables to garages being made when the vehicles themselves were being rebuilt.

Use of Electricity

The work consisted principally of installing equipment for charging the storage batteries and such machine shop facilities as were needed for making the routine adjustments to the fire apparatus.

The charging outlets were suspended from the ceiling in such a way that two batteries could be charged from the same plug.

The electrification of the Department began in 1917 after an unsatisfactory experience with gasoline drive.

Five pieces of electrical apparatus were purchased from the Commercial Truck Company.

These were Engine Number One and its Combination Wagon and Engine and Wagon Number Five and Truck Number Two.

Standard fire fighting equipment was mounted on specially designed electric chassis and so satisfactory did they prove that complete electrification was decided upon.

Electric Drive

While the first pieces were built as electrics, the balance were converted by removing the gasoline drive then in use, and installing electric drive.
Thus, much of the equipment, has undergone three revolutionary changes: as built originally it was drawn by horses; later gasoline tractors replaced the horses, and finally the electric motors and storage batteries were installed.

The method of changing the apparatus was in itself interesting.

In the case of the familiar engine, all the running gear forward of the gooseneck was removed, and channel beams, long enough and heavy enough to carry the storage batteries, the chauffeur's seat, and the driving and steering apparatus, were riveted on.

The rear wheels, the boiler, and the pumping apparatus were not touched.

Ladders

In changing the ladder trucks the frame was extended to provide place for the driving mechanism, the battery box was suspended under the frame and just forward of the rear wheels, and an entirely new set of wheels was mounted , each wheel having its individual motor.

A similar lengthening and strengthening of the frame and the installation of motors for each of the rear wheels accomplished the same result for the combination wagons.

Visitors to the New York Electrical Show of 1919 will recall the combination wagon which was exhibited.

This was one of the Paterson vehicles and was on its way from Philadelphia, where the Commercial Truck Company had made the changes, when the Paterson officials consented to its stopping over in New York.

By 1919, sixteen of the twenty-five pieces of apparatus had been changed to electric, and by the end of 1920 only three gasoline vehicles remained.

Speed of Vehicles

The speed of electric apparatus in reaching fires is strikingly shown in the annual report of 1919, the last year for which complete figures are available.

During 1919, the department responded to 511 alarms and reached the fires so promptly that in only four cases did the blaze extend beyond the original building.

The damage in the most disastrous fire of the year amounted to only $209,000.

The average loss in the next four fires was less than $50,000 while the average loss in all fires, including the big ones was less than $900.

Trials designed to show the fitness of electric trucks for fire department work were conducted recently by Thomas Coyle, Chief of the Paterson Fire Department.

One of the combination chemical trucks, weighing seven tons, was employed for the purpose, and heads of the fire departments of neighboring cities, including New York, as well as many of those interested in the electric vehicle industry, were present.

Negotiating Hills

Three hills were negotiated.

The first, on Temple Street, had a grade of fourteen per cent and was long but the truck climbed the distance in one minute and fifteen seconds.

The second grade was the Cliff Street incline of seventeen per cent which was achieved in the running time of sixty-two seconds.

Not only did the electric climb from a standing start, but it stopped in the middle of the hill and started again without any kind of assistance.

The third attempt was made over the Haledon Avenue course of nine blocks with an eight per cent grade and the climb was completed in the astonishingly short time of two minutes and two seconds.

A speed of thirty-four miles per hour was maintained on the level and at no time was any difficulty or hindrance experienced.

In reply to a question regarding the ability of the electric trucks to proceed under adverse weather conditions Chief Coyle made the statement that

"If electric trucks could not get through the winter snows nothing could" and that he and his associates believed that "the electric trucks are the most reliable, least expensive and best type of vehicle for fire department usage."

The Shops

Added to this testimony is that of Captain William H Ward who is in charge of the extensive workshop of the Central Fire Headquarters.

Captain Ward said that the labors of his department had "decreased nearly seventy per cent since the introduction of electric trucks three years ago," and that "except when they smashed into trees, not one of the electrics has ever been out of service for as long as twenty-four hours."

In fact there are now so few repairs called for, that Captain Ward has reduced his force of mechanics to one.

Under this arrangement the Captain does practically all of the repair work on apparatus while his "force" has kept busy during the fall and winter repairing the roofs of the engine houses.

BURIED IN COAL

On Aug. 14, 1897, Paterson firefighters rescued workers trapped by 1,200 tons of coal that slid out of a storage bin at the Edison Electric and Illuminating Co. 

The falling coal also crushed the plant's steam pipes and plunged Paterson  into darkness.

The shovelers ``were caught in the rush, but it came gradually at first, and no one was injured by it,'' according to The New York Times.

``No one could get out, and a dozen men were pinned in the coal, but they were quickly gotten out by the firemen who were summoned,'' the Times said.

PATERSON CHILDREN SAVED - 1911

On July 15, 1911, Paterson firefighter James Campbell, of Engine Co. 9, raced into a burning building at 568 Main Street and rescued two little boys - David Walker, 5, and his brother Robert, 3.

``Engine 9 was the first to reach the burning building and Campbell rushed up the stairs to the Walker apartment,'' according to The New York Times. 

''He found the place filled with smoke and flames. Groping his way about, he found the children on the floor, overcome by smoke. Wrapping them in his coat he made his way to the street,'' the Times said.

THE SILK CITY

• Paterson was once a thriving a textile town called the ``Silk City'' and the fire department protected a population of Old World immigrants - Italians, Jews and others - drawn to the looms. Following a tenement fire on Main Street: ``The fire department reported without qualification that twenty-one families and one band of gypsies had been left homeless,'' according to the 1974 book ``About Paterson'' by Christopher Norwood.
  
  
• Mayor Frank X. Graves - an old-school politician who served as chief executive from 1961-1966 and 1982 until his death in 1990 - patroled Paterson's streets in a black sedan equipped with police and fire radios. ``When he spotted a problem - a littered street, perhaps, or graffiti on a monument - he would use one of his two-way radios to demand immediate action from the appropriate municipal agency,'' The New York Times said in his obituary. ``He kept a child's doll and a softball in the car, which he gave to children at fire and accident scenes to calm them.''
  
  
• Paterson has languished since the textile mills started shutting down in the 1960s. Many buildings became abandoned - and some burned. In the Herald & News in March 2000, Paterson Deputy Fire Chief James Tice said: ``What we run into, time and again, are buildings where the owner files for bankruptcy, the heat gets turned off, the sprinkler pipes freeze and burst, and the system has to be shut down … We can take the owners to court and try to force them to fix it, but you can't get blood out of a stone.''

LOCKED IN A VAULT

May 8, 1923

``Firemen, policemen and civilians, working in relays until they were exhausted, burned and battered their way through an almost impregnable steel vault in a bank in Paterson, N.J., last night and, at the end of four hours desperate strife, brought out alive a 19-year-old clerk who had been locked in accidentally at 6 o'clock in the evening with a man-defying time lock set for 8:15 this morning,'' according to the May 9, 1923 edition of The New York Times.

CIVIL DEFENSE

Photo: Civil Defense Museum
In 1954, Paterson acquired a Civil Defense rescue truck similar to this photo. It was housed at fire headquarters at 115 Van Houten Street until 1968 when it was relocated to the Getty Avenue station.

WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS

"The Figure 5 in Gold" by Charles Demuth. William Carlos Williams' poem inspired the 1928 painting.

Williams Carlos Williams, 1883-1963, was a physician and influential American poet whose epic "Paterson'' is considered a personification of and tribute to the city. 

Williams - who practiced at the Passaic General Hospital - penned many other poems, including these lines about an encounter with a fire engine.

The Great Figure
Among the rain
and lights

I saw the figure 5
in gold

on a red

fire truck
moving
tense
unheeded
to gong clangs
siren howls
and wheels rumbling
through the dark city

FIREWORKS BLAST - 1901

Photo: patersonfirehistory.com

After twenty-two hours of digging in the ruins of yesterday's explosion at Paterson, N.J., work ceased this afternoon, and it is now believed all the bodies have been recovered. There are now seventeen. - The Washington Post

On June 21, 1901, fireworks exploded in a shop in a four-story tenement at 440 Main St., killing 17 people and trapping others.

Three firefighters were injured.

Rescuers used ladders and life nets to save people ``hanging from the windows ready to drop'' when the engines arrived, according to The New York Times.

The Times described the saving of John McGlone and his wife, who lived on the top floor:

``McGlone climbed out of the front window and hung on with one hand while he held his wife to his breast with the other. The ladders were all busy, and one of the life nets from Truck 1 was called into use. Twenty men held it, and McGlone was told to drop.

``With a superb show of strength he swung so as to carry his wife away from the building and then let go of her. She dropped into the net through the flame. As soon as she could be rolled out Of the net, it was placed for her husband, and he, too, landed safely in it.''

Still, the husband and wife were ``badly burned by their flight through the flames bursting from the windows below,'' according to the newspaper.

...


The following was published in the Sandusky Daily Star of Ohio:

Paterson, N. J., June 22. - So far as known there were 12 people killed and a number of others were injured in a fire following an explosion among a quantity of fireworks in the store of ABRAHAM M. RITTENBERG. The store was on the ground floor of a 4-story frame tenement building. The cause of the explosion is not known. The property loss is $35,000.

The following were killed:

MRS. LUCINDA ADAMSON.
MRS. CHARLES WILLIAMSON, burned while trying to rescue her husband.
CHARLES WILLIAMSON, helpless cripple, unable to leave bed.
HAROLD RITTENBERG, 10-months-old child of the keeper of the fireworks store.
WILLIE ELSASSER, six weeks old.
MRS. BERT BAMBER, whose husband is in the hospital.
JOHN BAMBER, 6-months-old child.
MRS. ANDREW ELVIN, head only found, trunk missing.
MRS. ANNA BURNS.
CLARENCE BURNS, six years old, found clasped in his mother's arms.
MRS. ANNIE LANNIGAN.
MRS. MARY DUFFY.
Total number of bodies recovered, 12.

The missing:

JOSEPH ELVIN, two weeks old, mother's head found.
MRS. ANNE FENTEMAN.
Two Nephews of MRS. LANNIGAN, whose body has been found.
MRS. MARY ELSASSER, kept baker shop, child's body found.

The Injured Are:

J. JESSUP, bruised about the head and body and burned about the head.
MRS. J. JESSUP, bruised and burned about the body.
I. BAMBURGER, head and face bruised.
NICHOLAS HILLMAN, cut on head.
GEORGE SODER, cut on face.
Fireman EDWARD LINGLAND, injured by falling wall.
MR. and MRS. JOHN McGLONE, burned about face and body.

The building in which the explosion occurred was a frame tenement four stories high, with stores on the ground floor. The middle store was occupied by RITTENBERG. Ten families occupied flats in the building. So great was the force of the explosion that a boy playing in the street half a block away was lifted to his feet and hurled against an iron fence, one of his legs being broken. A trolley car was directly in front of the building when the explosion occurred. The burst of flame blown out into the street scorched the sides of the car and singed the hair of the passengers.

A number of those who were on the upper floors of the building when the explosion took place were either stunned or burned to death or found escape cut off and were suffocated. After the first explosion there was a succession of smaller ones, and then came a second big explosion, which was muffled and deadened, and probably occurred in the cellar.

Every window seemed to be spouting flames within a minute after the first explosion. A woman, her clothing on fire, leaped out of one of the windows and fell to the yard below. Her body was dragged out of reach of the flames, but the flesh was roasted and dropped from the bones. She later proved to be a MRS. WILLIAMS.

MRS. WILLIAMS' husband was a cripple. His wife is supposed to have remained longer than she could with safety in an effort to save him. He was found burned to a crisp on his bed.

Some of the occupants of the rooms dropped from the windows and were bruised. Others hung from the windows until the firemen came, and twenty persons were taken down in this way through the fire and smoke by the firemen, while others dropped into life nets.

RITTENBERG will probably be arrested pending an investigation. In the debris was found the head of a man or woman.

FIRE HORSES

Photo: www.patersonhistory.com

Horses joined the Paterson Fire Department on May 1, 1884, along with the city's first paid fireman - William Whittaker, a driver for Engine Co. 1.

That's according to the 1985 book ``Taking the Heat'' by the Honor Legion Firefighters of Northern New Jersey. Before the horses, the early volunteers used brute force to move their apparatus, hence the phrase ``Making a run.''

Paterson placed its first motorized fire engine in service in 1910 and continued using horses for another decade. The final run of Paterson's fire horses was made on July 4, 1920 to Box 634 - East 18th Street and Third Avenue - for a fire at 755 River Street.

It has often been said that fire horses received better treatment than firemen. The following news dispatch from Paterson - published in The Washington Post via The New York Telegram on Sept. 24, 1910 - supports that argument:

``An operation performed today by Dr. Matthew A. Pierce, city veterinarian, on a horse in Fire Engine Company No. 4, to ascertain the cause of a lump which had been raised on the animal's shoulder, resulted in finding a 10-cent piece. It was imbedded in the flesh nearly an inch."

TORNADO OF 1903

Photo: Passaic County Historical Society

Ruins of at 680 Main St.

A tornado churned across South Paterson, Sandy Hill and East Side Park on July 22, 1903 - causing several deaths, toppling homes and damaging mills, hospitals and other structures.

``Firemen were summoned from all parts of the city to the stricken sections to aid in searching for the dead and caring for the injured,'' The New York Times said.

The tornado was the third disaster to strike Paterson in little over a year.

In 1902, the Great Fire swept much of the city. A flood followed a few weeks later.

PATERSON OPERA HOUSE - 1914

Photo: patersonfirehistory.com

Photo: lambertcastle.org

UPDATED NOVEMBER 2019

On Jan. 6, 1914, a general alarm fire gutted the Paterson Opera House, spread to the adjacent Donahue Building and triggered a backdraft that scorched firefighters .  

Trouble with the municipal fire alarm telegraph lines sent engines to the wrong address, allowing flames time to gain headway at the rear of the opera house.

At its height, the blaze threatened an entire block along Main Street between Market and Ward, including the Lockwood Brothers furniture business and the McBride Building, according to the Morning Call newspaper.

"There was a panic among the Italians living in the neighboring tenements, and many were rescued scantily clad,'' The New York Times said.

Firefighters advanced a hose line through the front of the opera house and under the stage and positioned another from a adjacent saloon owned by Joseph Donahue. Others attacked the blaze from the rear of the building.

On Main Street street, crews raised tower pipes to cascade water onto the flames.

"They jumped in and fought like tigers," said Fire Chief Thomas Coyle, quoted by the Paterson Press. 

The backdraft sent men "stumbling out of the lobby,'' the Morning Call said. "When the great cloud of hot air and smoke shot through (sic) the men on the lines had the instinct to hold fast to their water," the newspaper said.

Six firefighters were injured at the blaze. Newspapers identified them as Captain Frank Boyle of Truck 3, Louis Shauger and Andrew "Andy" Green of Company 6, Dennis Toomey of Engine 7 and Lieutenant Martin Gleason and Edward Hepp of Engine 9.

Box 52 served as the fire alarm station for block. But the bells initially tapped out Box 512, sending apparatus to Ellison and Mill streets, the Morning Call said. It was suspected that "wires burned by the heat" scrambled a signal from an auxiliary alarm station in the opera house, Box 522.    

The Opera House was considered a ``vanity house,'' according to the Passaic County Historical Society, "owned, supported, managed and patronized by the rising business and managerial classes of Paterson."

Citing its influence in the community, the historical society said: "The theatre reviewer of the Daily Press concerned himself more with a description of the audience than with the presentation on stage'' when attending a performance.

In 1916, a movie house - the United States Theatre - opened on the site.

ALEXANDER HAMILTON - 1984

Removing victims

Alexander Hamilton Hotel in its heyday

-

Photo: The Ledger - Google News Archives

Woman trapped by fire on 8th floor of Alexander Hamilton Hotel in Paterson in October 1984 clasps towel to breath. The blaze, set by an arsonist, claimed 15 lives.

-

By Vinny Del Giudice

On Oct. 18, 1984, an arson fire swept the shabby Alexander Hamilton Hotel in downtown Paterson - a once elegant building that fell into disrepair - killing 15 people and injuring about 60 others.

"People were screaming, trying to tie sheets and blankets together to get out the windows," said hotel resident Lusylvia Rivera, 33, quoted by the Associated Press. She fled with her three children from a room on the first floor of the residential hotel. "The ones who were more scared just went ahead and jumped," Rivera said.

Box 181 - Market and Church streets - was transmitted at 12:14 a.m. and the incident ``quickly escalated to three alarms and all of the city's fire units responded, as did firefighters from five nearby towns,'' The New York Times said. ''We have people trapped, we have people jumping,'' Paterson Fire Capt. Domenick Cotroneo told The Times.

Fire Chief William Comer, quoted by the AP, said "the fire spread so fast and the flames were so intense" that the blaze jumped from the third floor through air ducts and engulfed four or five floors of the eight-story hotel.

Battalion Chief Frank Crampton said Paterson firefighters encountered "very poor visibility, panicky people, unconscious people lying on floors," according to the AP.

Harry Moore, who escaped from the second floor with his wife and two babies, said "It happened all of the sudden," according to the AP. "A girl knocked on the door and screamed, 'Get out of the place,'" Moore said. "When we got out, the place was in flames. We grabbed what we could, the babies first of course."

Some victims succumbed to their injuries days later, including Christino Ramirez, 53, who died Oct. 24 at Hackensack Medical Center's burn unit. ''When he arrived here he had third-degree burns over 90 percent of his body,'' said Lisa Hoffman, a hospital spokeswoman quoted by United Press International.

Russell W. Conklin, 44, a TV repairman and resident of the hotel, was convicted of manslaughter and arson and sentenced to prison on Nov. 6, 1985. The Washington Post described Conklin as "an embittered handyman who may have been drunk."

Paterson Mayor Frank X. Graves, quoted by the AP, said Conklin "had a fight with the night manager. He's the one that supposedly started the fire. The manager locked the guy in the room. He lit the sheets on fire and climbed out the back window. The suspect is saying this."

Conklin served more than a decade behind bars and was released from a state prison on April 23, 1997, according to the web site of the New Jersey Department of Corrections.

Investigators determined paint and other materials stored in the hotel fueled the flames.

Passaic, Clifton and Hawthorne were among the communities to send mutual aid.

The Hamilton tragedy recalled an arson fire that killed six people at the Midtown Hotel on Dec. 10, 1968. Box 141 was transmitted at 10:58 p.m. for 2 Park Ave. and escalated to a general alarm.

Another arson fire on Oct. 15, 1981 killed eight people at an apartment building at 89 Park Ave.

An even deadlier fire on Nov. 4, 1917 claimed 19 lives at the Salvation Army Rescue Mission. That fire was apparently an accident.

The Alexander Hamilton Hotel was named for the first U.S. Treasury secretary. In 1791, Hamilton led a group of investors in creating the Society for Establishing Useful Manufactures, which led to the creation of the city. The society was organized to harness the power of the Great Falls on the Passaic River.

In June 1995, The Times published a story about plans to renovate hotel:

``When people talked about fancy hotels in those days, they talked about the Alexander Hamilton. Built in 1930, the 170-room hotel was a natural magnet for the rich and powerful, a handsome eight-story brick building just two blocks from City Hall and surrounded by cigar and fedora stores and the famed Fabian Theater. ... But as the city declined in the 1960's, so did the hotel. Factories closed because of labor unrest and high costs, the well-to-do fled to the suburbs, crime and unemployment rose and the hotel fell into disrepair.''

When the arsonist struck, ``The ballrooms were stacked to the ceiling with mattresses. Garbage was everywhere and there was a stench of sewage. People passed out in the stairwells. Only the cockroaches thrived,'' the newspaper said.

VINTAGE PATERSON FLEET

Photos: http://www.patersonhistory.com and Thomas Dayspring

Paterson Engines 12, 5 and 3

IN THE BEGINNING

Photo: ePodunk.com

In 1894, a man named William Nelson published an account of firefighting in Paterson, New Jersey, in the years before the Civil War entitled "Records of the Paterson Fire Association 1821-1854.''

The subtitles of Nelson's book were ``With the Laws Relating to the Association'' as well as ``Accounts of Fires and other Matters of Interest, From Contemporary Newspapers.''

In the introduction, Nelson said: ``No record is known of the first organization in Paterson to combat fire. It is believed, however, that Engine Co. No. 1 was formed about 1815.'' In doing his research, Nelson said ``a careful search through the records of Paterson from 1815 to 1819 has brought to light'' only a two brief items related to fires.

The first was an account of a blaze at the residence on the inventor Samuel Colt, who lived at 120 Market Street, on Dec. 31, 1815. The second was about a fire in late June or early July 1819 at the home of John Amens. The Colt residence was saved. The Amens residence was not.

RUNS & WORKERS

Photo: Bill Tompkins, FireRescue1.com

A general alarm fire hit a lumber yard on Fulton Street in Paterson on Aug. 13, 2006. "Firefighters faced a heavy fire condition, water problems, access problems and many exposure problems,'' according to FireRescue1.com.

Photo: Firehouse.com

Fire hit 34-334 Market St., Paterson on Nov. 3, 2003. "After an aggressive interior attack, companies were forced to evacuate the building and operate from the exterior as the structure became fully involved on the top floor," according to firehouse.com.

A general alarm fire struck 559 Main St. in Paterson on Oct. 29, 2000. Winds turned a house fire into a conflagration - destroying three dwellings, damaging six others and leaving 55 people homeless, The New York Times said. The general alarm fire started at about 2:05 p.m. in a two-and-a-half-story wood-frame row house, Battalion Chief Edward McLaughlin told The Times.

BUS ACCIDENT

Paterson Morning Call

May 5, 1938

FIRE ENGINE COLLISION WITH BUS INJURES 29

Twenty three persons including six firemen of Engine Company No.9 were injured shortly before 11 O’clock last night when a Paterson – Passaic bus owned by the Public Service Transportation Company crashed into the side of the apparatus of Engine Co. 9 in front of the fire company’s quarters on Main Street near Van Winkle.

CREW OF ENGINE 9:

• Capt. Hobart Strathern
• Driver Stephen Walls
• Fireman William McCorry
• Fireman Daniel Stevens
• Fireman David Quakenbush
• Fireman Joseph Carr

PATERSON MILL FIRES

Photo: http://www.patersongreatfalls.org/

Ruins of Colt Gun Mill

Spectacular fires have plagued Paterson's mills since the first settlers, from a blaze that destroyed the Little Beaver Mill in 1832 to a series of arson fires 150 years later that gutted the historic Colt Gun Mill.

The Fulton Street Fire - a general alarm at Box 151 - started on April 29, 1978 and devoured mills and adjacent buildings as well as three fire department vehicles - Engine 2, Engine 5 and Battalion 2. Hundreds of firefighters from across North Jersey provided mutual aid.

General alarm fires also destroyed the Ashley-Bailey Mill in 1904, the Lamond Robertson Carpet Mill in 1930, the Ramsey & Gore Mill in 1939, the Appel Mill in 1944 and St. Anthony's Guild in 1973. Mill fires requiring second- and a third-alarm assignments were commonplace.

An account of the Little Beaver Mill fire, published in the Paterson Intelligencer of May 2, 1832, said: ``In a very few minutes the whole premises were involved in a sheet of flame. The firemen soon arrived with their engines, but the progress of the fire was already such, that little else could be done that to preserve the buildings adjacent."

In a story headlined ``The Paterson Hemp and Rope Manufactory Almost Wholly Destroyed,'' The Washington Post reported on a July 21, 1890 fire at the ``extensive machine works of S. J. C. Todd, one of the oldest manufacturing establishments in this city.''

Later that year, The New York Times reported: ``Fire was discovered in the engine room which adjoins the main building of the extensive silk mill of Bamford Brothers on Rip Van Winkle Avenue'' on Nov. 22, 1890 and ``an hour later the entire establishment was completely destroyed.''

On Dec. 10, 1926, ``The old Van Kirk mills, a series of two and three story brick buildings occupied by forty silk manufacturers, were destroyed by fire,'' The Times said. ``Because of a number of explosions during the blaze Fire Chief Thomas Coyle started an investigation to learn if the fire was of incendiary origin.''

As for Samuel Colt's gun works, the four-story brownstone at the Great Falls opened in 1836 and over five years produced 5,000 rifles and revolvers. Various manufacturers occupied after Colt's company failed in 1842. By the 1980s, the mill had fallen into disrepair and arsonists finished it off.