New York City

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May 19, 1903. American Mutoscope & Biograph Co.
Two hook-and-ladders, two steam pumpers, and a rescue wagon return to the 'house'. Note the kids running along and hanging on the back of some of the vehicles.

"In 1901, New York City was only three years old. Although much larger, the city and its fire department had not changed too much. Steam fire engines and wooden aerial ladder trucks were still pulled by horses. Telephones had been in use for two decades, but the department still relied on telegraph and bells for alarms." - Steven Scher / New York City Firefighting 1901-2001

Queer Street Characters
(Originally published 1893)

“Made up my mind about somethin'. Not gonna run wid de machine no more.”

Was it the fireman in real life or the fire laddie of the stage who gave rise to the slang that centred around the life of the volunteer fireman? For a long time, in my school-days, "Mose," "Lize," and "Syksey" were familiar names upon our play-grounds, and we shouted to "wash her out" or "take de butt" as if we were veritable Chanfraus. The caricatures of the period found inexhaustible fun in "Mose," with, his red shirt, black broadcloth pantaloons tucked into his boot-tops, his elfin "soap-locks" hanging over each ear and down his close-shaven cheeks, his tall silk hat perched on one side of his head, and his broadcloth coat hung over his left arm. For his "Lize" he ordered pork and beans in the restaurant, and bade the waiter, "Don't yer stop ter count a bean," and to "Lize" he remarked, as he drove out on the road, It isn't a graveyard we're passin'; it's mile-stones." Possibly a new generation does not see anything laugh-able in these traditional jokes, but to the men of that period they stood for living actualities, the dashing heroes of many a fierce battle with the dread forces of fire.

I honor the old volunteer firemen. When one of the battered "machines" of former days passes by in a public procession I feel like taking off my hat to it, as I always do to the tattered colors that I have followed on many a fierce field of fight. Ah, what nights of noise and struggle were those in which the engines rattled down pavement or sidewalk, drawn by scores of willing hands and ushered into action by the hoarse cries of hundreds of cheering voices. There was no boy's play around the engine when once it began to battle with the flames. Men left their pleasant firesides to risk their lives for the preservation of the lives and property of others, and they did it without bravado, as if it were but one of the ordinary duties of their lot. They had their jealousies and their prejudices, their feuds and their fights of rival organizations, but all met alike on the common ground of self-sacrifice for the common good. All classes of society were represented in the ranks of the firemen. The mechanic and the son of the wealthy merchant were in-distinguishable under the volunteer's heavy hat, and emulated each other in labors and daring. College graduates drew the silver-mounted carriage of Amity Hose to the scene of peril, and then the boys of "Old Columbia" did as good work amid the flames as the gilt-edged boys of the Seventh Regiment did after-wards through the long years of war. And then the firemen's processions-were they not superb? What a magnificent polish the engines took, and how exuberantly they were garlanded with flowers, and how full were the long lines of red-shirted laddies who manned the ropes and were the cynosure of the ad-miring eyes of all feminine Gotham! The men who carried the trumpets were the conquering heroes of the day and the envy of every boyish beholder. It seems a pity that their glory should have departed. Has it departed? I open the book of memory again, and they are all there, and the glory of their record is - undimmed:
"Those ahold of hook-and-ladder ropes No less to me than the gods of the antique wars."