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Saturday, December 19, 2009

Kensington Calamity

Difficulties in fire service evolution also plagued the Montgomery County railroad community of Kensington. It was subdivided in 1890 as Knowles Station a stop along the B&O Metropolitan Division and namesake of the original land parcel. It becomes Kensington upon incorporation as a town in 1892.

Before the end of 1899, fire protection comes to Kensington when the town acquires a hand drawn reel and chemical cart. They also hire a fire marshal to oversee the equipment as well as organize volunteer firefighters from the citizenry. By 1918, a group of regular volunteers come to be known as the First Firemen of Kensington something of club reliant on the town’s apparatus. On the night of January 2, 1921, the Kensington firehouse an old schoolhouse occupied since 1916 burns to the ground with all records and apparatus lost. This is in spite of a response from Silver Spring Volunteer Fire Department, the Rockville Volunteer Fire Company (precursor to today’s Rockville VFD) plus two engines from the District of Columbia Fire Department.

After, the Kensington Fire Company acquires a new engine and is back in service by December 1922 perhaps from their pre 1916 shed. Soon after, tension develops with the First Firemen who seek greater access to the new engine for training. They are repeatedly denied by the town’s Fire Marshal who retains a key to the station house. On a cold windy night possibly in March, the Kensington Fire Company is called to a house fire in Garrett Park. While pulling the hill up from Rock Creek, the engine runs out of gas. The volunteers push it to the scene and eventually commandeer enough fuel to get the new engine in service. This leads to greater dissention between the town Fire Marshal and the First Firemen.

In summer 1923, Kensington’s First Firemen separate from the Kensington Fire Company purchasing their own new engine that is housed in various members’ garages. In October 1925, the First Firemen incorporate as the Kensington Volunteer Fire Department. Still at odds with the town fire company and Fire Marshal, the town commissioners call a meeting. As a result the Kensington Fire Company is abolished its apparatus turned over to the Kensington Volunteer Fire Department henceforth the town’s sole provider of fire protection.

In the years to follow, the Kensington Volunteer Fire Department expands moving to a new firehouse that remains today as well as growing to four stations the others in Glenmont, Veirs Mill Village and Aspen Hill. It is today within the Fourth Battalion of the Montgomery County Fire Rescue Service. The rest as they say is history.

Tuesday, December 8, 2009

Bethesda Boondoggle

In researching and writing about fire service histories one occasionally comes across evolutionary tales that stand out from the rest. These are of course rooted in some degree of mayhem and discontent proving at least that sometimes folks don’t get along or things just don’t work right. This is not to pick on anyone of any one locality as this sort of thing has happened in one degree or another in several places. What follows is one of the more extreme scenarios in Montgomery County’s Bethesda area the details of which follow.

Long a toll stop and PO along the turnpike between Georgetown / Washington DC and Rockville, Bethesda begins to emerge into a residential suburb after 1910. Its first fire protection is a voluntary citizen brigade begun about 1913. By the mid 1920’s, the place is more developed and a serious fire in the northern streetcar village Alta Vista leads to the formation of a fire board. Consisting of area businessmen and merchants they establish the Bethesda Fire Department an all-volunteer operation in service by years end in 1926. Of note, the board apparently also has designs on expanding to Chevy Chase already protected by a voluntary citizens brigade and a separate but primitive volunteer company. Chevy Chase forms its own board instead and the rest is well history -best suited for another entry.

Back to Bethesda, its new volunteer department adequately serves the community into the 1930s. While most of the nation is in a depression, lower Montgomery County including Bethesda is growing largely from recent residential development attracting the expanding ranks of federal workers under the New Deal Government. This is enhanced by plans for new federal campus facilities like the under construction Naval Medical Hospital and the proposed National Institutes of Health. The period also brings some tough brush fire seasons in the spring and fall months taxing resources as companies are seemingly fighting one day-long blaze after another.

Bethesda merchants and businesses are increasingly concerned over their employees regularly out the door fighting fires all the day. As described in William Offut’s 500–page Bethesda a Social History, the fire board by 1938 seeks to add paid firemen and a paid chief to “improve the morale, skill and professionalism of the department”. The paid crew could handle most of the daytime calls including for the ambulance (yes the Bethesda FD had run an ambulance since 1930). At night they could serve as ready drivers for the wagon, pumper, rescue car and ambulance staffed fully as before by incoming volunteers.

This seemed like a great idea and besides the Chevy Chase FD was partially paid using volunteers for their second-out engine. This however draws immediate opposition from the department’s volunteer fire chief and some of the members. Many object to losing the drovers duty citing that one of the reasons they volunteer. The Board offers the volunteer chief a paid position and rank but he refuses. On July 1, 1939, a retired chief of training from the District of Columbia Fire Department becomes the first paid Fire Chief of the Bethesda FD with three firefighters also hired taken from the volunteer ranks. The volunteer chief and a few loyal followers soon after organize and incorporate under the Volunteer Fire Department No 1 of Bethesda Maryland.

Both entities operate at first from the same firehouse on Old Georgetown Road (where Woodmont Avenue is now). Over the next months conflict intensifies with some of the volunteers refuse to take direction from the new Fire Chief. In October, the Bethesda Fire Board bars the volunteers from the station however several are hired back in subsequent weeks. The Bethesda FD henceforth is an all paid operation expanding eventually to two shifts.

As for the outcast VFD No 1 of Bethesda, they manage to build a firehouse and are in service by March 18, 1941. Located about a block or so away on Fairmont Avenue near Norfolk Avenue in the "Triangle", they add a new “Butterfly” Hahn 500-gpm engine, a used Buffalo 500-gpm engine and a used Stutz Chemical service ladder truck. Conflict between the two continues as they end up in court fighting over a phone number. The judge gives the disputed number to both on a party line with the first one to answer the department in charge. It is likely both regularly respond to most fires with the original Bethesda FD still running the ambulance at least until the next year when wartime personnel losses take from the ranks of both. The VFD No 1 of Bethesda ceases service and disbands finally in mid 1944.

The Bethesda FD expands to three (briefly four) area stations in later years. While one of the first fire departments in the county to operate an ambulance, they do not return to this service as in December 1945 the re-started Bethesda-Chevy Chase First Aid Corps later Rescue Squad becomes and still is the areas emergency ambulance provider. As a side-note, B-CC Rescue in 1949 moves into the old VFD No 1 of Bethesda station on Fairmont Avenue remaining there until fall of 1956. The ’41 “Butterfly” Hahn stays local as well winding up at the Kensington VFD seen in photos as Engine 26. The Bethesda FD, Kensington VFD and B-CC Rescue Squad continue today under the Montgomery County Fire Rescue Service. The rest as they say is history. -RG

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

In the Beginning

Everything has a beginning and for me and the world of blogging this is it. That means the old man is learning a few new tricks. The purpose of this blog is to discuss and promote various topics related to the Fire Department as well as aspects of my home based and directly related endeavor Rustys Rosters.


Some background first. Rustys Rosters was born in late 1999 as a "book" about the Fire Department for various localities around greater Washington DC. Each book included for its particular subject locality (Arlington County VA was the first) current station apparatus listings, other relavent info and data as well as historic info on fire department evolution. This is info I have gathered over the years and as an "obsessive compulsive know it all" am able to retain in my head and articulate to others so as to share. These books were designed as guide for those following specific localities as sort of an anything you wanted to know reference. Yes it catered to fire apparatus as well as fire service history buffs including photographers aka fire-pixers.


As these soft cover spiral bound roster books gained in popularity I began covering Alexandria, Fairfax County in Virginia, Washington DC plus Montgomery County and Prince Georges County in Maryland. Then came Anne Arundel County, Baltimore County, Baltimore City and Howard County. Whew this all became a bunch of work! Somewhere along the way I also added color photos something that certainly enhanced each but also added to the cost and the work to produce them. Then as the decade of Y2K progressed, it seemed everythings especially apparatus fleets began to change at a frequency not before seen. So began a pattern -I'd get a book updated for sale, then nothing then just about the time say 5 new engines and 3 ambos are delivered come a slew of orders. The old man found himself pulling his hair out just to fill orders.


Now throw a few personnal crisies and a move to the Eastern Shore in there and it was time to move on to a different product if you will. Yes we tried the "big books" as they came to be known in 3-ring binders. We also began listing these for sale on our Ebay Store "Bayside-Boyz". This combined with direct marketing the transition went well. Still there were too many pages to have to constantly update just because a few new rigs get delivered. It was time to evolve further, so the rosters were meshed into multi-juresdictional products stapled -and for far less $$$. DC-MD Metro, NoVa Metro, Southern Maryland as they are today, printed with card stock covers and mailed. As for the historic stuff, something I have come to enjoy as much of not more than today's massive wagons and monster medics those became works of their own. Similar style books followed on Loudoun County Virginia, Montgomery County and Prince George's County in Maryland. We ran with his format until about late 2008 when the economy tanked and sales dropped considerably. Great time for changes and enhancements.


So after a bit of a hyatus, Rustys Rosters as of August 2009 is back but this time is a bit different. Instead of printed on paper books we have instead Books on CD. These are in pdf format, the CD burned with each book and associated files of related maps and indexes. Initially, the idea was to e-mail these direct as E-Books. Ebay however does not allow this so for now we have just the CD versions. Currently available are several multi-juresdictional rosters and various history works including a new History of Washington DC and its Fire Service and a Fire Rescue Apparatus History also for Washington DC. This goes along with the ever popular and improved Fire Station History Guide for Washington DC. Others are available and in the works for other localities. The future may also bring a web site, E-books direct e-mailed and only if by popular demand the old printed on paper versions. We also expect to probably add photos at some point but thats a job unto itself. So without further ado, heres the link to our store:


We just have a all or general inventory but as the store expands new categories will follow including one specifically for Rustys Rosters. Do check back here often as we plan to ad info on our works plus other fire department and apparatus related discussions, images and the like. We will also post requests for info related to other efforts in progress like apps history on Montgomery County Maryland. Thank you all of your patronage and support and do visit often.