Department History
The first firehouse of the Sound Beach Volunteer Fire Department, Inc.
That, in the good old days, most fires resulted in a total loss was a serious problem to the Sound Beach District of Greenwich. In 1904, a group of citizens decided that something must be done. On Thursday, April 14th, "taxpayers, residents and all other interested persons" were urged to attend a fire protection meeting.
At the third meeting, held April 29th at the School House, a formal organization was effected. By‑laws and the name "Sound Beach Hose Company No. 1" were adopted. The roll showed fifteen active members. Geary A. Shasty was elected Foreman and G. Nelson Palmer 1st Assistant Foreman.
Little real action took place for over a year, although the members met regularly and the purchase of forty‑two badges was recorded. Then, in May, 1905, the committee on apparatus reported that a complete outfit could be bought for the sum of $2,000. At that same meeting a suitable location for a fire house was discussed, and it was proposed that the department acquire a parcel of the old school grounds.
The following month, on June 19th, the Sound Beach School District voted to grant the desired land to the Town of Greenwich. In turn, the town appropriated $$2,000 for the fire house. This firehouse, added to several times, served the district until 1962 when the Town replaced it with the present station.
This building was completed sometime in the late summer. In November a "nearly new" hose wagon and five hundred feet of hose were purchased. The price of the wagon ($300) was considerably less than half its original cost.
Besides carrying a single thirty-foot ladder, two soda‑acid hand extinguishers and eighty feet of hose, the wagon had room for a half‑dozen men. The remaining volunteers hastened to the fire on foot or by any other handy conveyance.
The hose wagon served its purpose well. True, it looked more like a "glorified cart" than a dashing steam engine or hook and ladder that we usually associate with those times. It was drawn, not by powerful galloping steeds, but by two, often tired, horses from the nearby livery stables. The townspeople, roused from sleep by the clanging alarm of the newly acquired locomotive tires, at last knew the meaning of fire protection.
During this period, the need arose for more hose, and two hand reels or jumpers were added. One of these was kept in the firehouse, and the other in a barn on the Shore Road. These and the hose wagon remained in use until 1914.
The End of the Horse and Buggy Era
By 1913, fewer horses were to be seen and the "gasoline buggy" was gaining in popularity. In fact, it wasn't unusual to see one of the hand reels bouncing along behind the Morgan Brothers' car -- and, of course, arriving at the fire long before the hose wagon.
The volunteers began to talk about motorized apparatus. Of what use was the hose wagon without horses? And where could they be found?
One of the first motorized firetrucks for the Department.
The price of an auto truck looked like a vast amount compared with the cost of the hose wagon. Although the volunteers had raised $1,000 towards the purchase price, they feared it would be many years before they could reach the full amount.
An unexpected request by the residents of Riverside to be given protection by the hose company came with the promise of a cash contribution. Spurred on by this offer the company quickly raised the balance of the $4500 needed to purchase a Velie combination chemical and hose truck, which was delivered on 15 May 1914.
The Velie was an awesome sight as it rumbled down the avenue, splendid in its red paint, brass lamps and trim. The old timers were proud of its equipment, consisting of fifteen hundred feet of hose, one hundred forty five gallons of chemicals, two ladders, and almost every other kind of firefighting gadget in existence. There were crowbars, hatchets, sledgehammers, all sort of wrenches, hose straps and jackets, and a rail on which helmets and rubber coats were hung.
This new apparatus helped to make a reduction in fire losses. It could reach the scene of a fire much quicker -- its speed on the straightaway was an amazing fifty miles an hour -- and it carried chemicals to put out a fire where there was a lack of water.
There were other improvements, too. Hydrants had been installed, insuring a better water supply. Sirens, among the first in the country, replaced the locomotive wheels used to signal a fire. The sirens sounded code numbers to alert the firemen to the location of an alarm. Volunteer Alden McMurty, somewhat of an electrical genius, had installed the new siren. Since to his way of thinking, it wasn't nearly loud enough, he rigged up a new device on the roof of the firehouse ‑ a breech‑loading cannon. The first blast, sounding like an explosion, terrified the town. Needless to say, it was banned.
The Sound Beach Fire Patrol Company
With the added responsibility of protecting a greater territory, it was deemed necessary to form a patrol company. This was organized on April 2, 1914, with G. Nelson Palmer as its captain. In July, the company bought its first patrol car, a Buick.
The Sound Beach Fire Patrol Company was closely affiliated with the fire department and assisted it in many ways. Among its duties is to establish fire lines, direct traffic at the scene of fires and to guard, cover and salvage the contents of burning buildings.
Two months later, the Sound Beach Hose Company No. I became the Sound Beach Fire Department. The department was incorporated on March 2, 1916.
With its new status, the foreman of the old company, Albert F. Palmer, assumed the title of chief. He served in this capacity until May 10, 1923.
1933 Company photo at Binney Park
The Years of Growth
A Seagrave triple‑combination pumper was purchased in 1921 for $12,500. It carried hose, chemicals and a 750 GPM (gallons per minute) pump. Engine No. 1 enabled the volunteers to connect hose to a distant water supply and still maintain enough pressure to extinguish a fire. In 1925, the company invested $6500 to purchase a smaller pumper, Engine No. 2, of the same type.
Less than three years later, the department spent $10,000 for a ladder truck. Truck No. 1 carried three hundred seventy‑five feet of ladders, a chemical tank, portable life net, flood lights, life belts, gas masks and all sorts of other fireÂfighting equipment.
In 1923, the department began sponsoring the annual Memorial Day Parade.
Until 1931, when they were prohibited by state law, the Department ran carnivals whose raffles and games were enjoyed by the community and many from out of town. The carnivals raised the funds necessary to keep the equipment up to date. During World War I they also raised funds for the Home Guard and the Red Cross. During the depression, a welfare committee of the Fire Department dispensed some carnival proceeds to purchase food and coal for those unemployed in the days before unemployment insurance.
Assistant Chief Clifford Frost (Ret.) driving the Department's 1931 Seagrave pumber in a parade
In 1931, after seventeen years of service, the old Velie was traded in on the purchase of a third Seagrave pumper. Unlike the engines before it, Engine No. 3 contained ‘booster tanks’ which held water instead of chemicals. It served the district for 33 years until it was retired in 1964. It was later repurchased from a collector with personal funds of Department members and has been fully restored to operating condition.
An emergency truck was acquired in 1939, and in 1947 a $10,000 Seagrave triple‑combination 750 GPM pumper replaced Engine No. 2. In this same year, a Cadillac ambulance, costing $8,000, was given to the deÂpartment by the people of Old Greenwich and Riverside in memory of those who gave their lives in World War 11. The drive for the funds was sponÂsored by the town Lions Club.
By 1954, the department had grown to six pieces of apparatus; the most modern was the Seagrave 75‑foot Aerial ladder truck which was purchased in 1943 for $36,047. All but $1,047 of this amount was supplied by the Town of Greenwich. The old Truck No. 1 was donated to the Vista, NY fire department after a major fire in their firehouse destroyed all of their working apparatus.
Due to the large number of seasonally occupied summer homes and inns along the shoreline, there were many large fires that burned unchecked for some time before the department was notified. By the 1950s the department had installed twenty‑eight fire Âalarm boxes at strategic points in Old Greenwich and Riverside. Costing about $250 each, they were maintained in good order by the department until a town-wide system was implemented and service taken over by the town.
The Sound Beach Volunteer Fire Department Marching Band
It was also in the 1950’s that the department began sponsoring the Sound Beach Fire Department Marching Band.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the Department expanded the alarm system and their membership, topping out at well over 100 members. The local industrial base of Electrolux and other companies ensured that there would be a large number of available personnel to respond to alarms. These years were prosperous ones for the department; additional apparatus and equipment was purchased with donated funds to complement items supplied by the Town to its fire stations. Paid drivers were installed in all town firehouses to ensure daytime response to alarms.
The Sound Beach Firehouse
In the early 1960’s it was determined that the existing wood-framed fire station that had withstood several expansions needed to be replaced with a more modern structure. Over the period of several months, the existing station was dismantled and the apparatus moved to other locations within the district as the current brick-and-steel firehouse was constructed.
The construction of I-95 increased the department’s response area and divided the district. The fire department was charged with responding to the highway as well as the areas north of Route 1. The older, smaller apparatus was no match for the big highways and increased number of alarms. These were gradually replaced in the mid sixties with newer, more effective firefighting machines. The Seagrave pumpers gave way to two American LaFrance engines with larger water tanks, more seating and bigger compartmentation. The ’54 ladder was replaced in 1973 with a 100’ American LaFrance aerial that today serves as a reserve piece in the town’s fleet. A new Ford fire patrol vehicle was purchased as was an International Squad / Light truck unit. This squad became the precursor to the rescue we have today when a Hurst ‘Jaws of Life’ tool was added to handle a growing number of auto accidents. Sound Beach had long prided itself on its ability to handle responses to calls for rescues and this became a big step towards the next generation of services offered to the community by the department.
The Ambulance Corps
Between the 1950s and the 1970s, the response area for the department changed drastically as post-war housing boomed throughout the North Mianus, Riverside and Old Greenwich sections of town. Areas like Havemeyer Park and portions of Riverside expanded in a matter of years from farmer’s fields to active neighborhoods. More stress had been placed on the ambulance service the department offered as the community grew. The Sound Beach Volunteer Ambulance Corps was incorporated to take some of the load off of the officers and firefighters in 1976. Consisting of firefighter and non-firefighter Emergency Medical Technicians, as required by new stringent state and federal laws, it was headed by a Captain and two Lieutenants reporting to the Chief of the Department. In 1986, a former captain of the Corps was named Executive Director of Greenwich EMS, which was formed to handle the increasing call volume and the need to provide paramedic level advanced life support services. By the late 1980’s the Town shifted fully to using GEMS as the primary emergency medical responders and Ambulance 155 was donated to GEMS.
The Last Quarter Century
Mianus River Bridge Collapse (June 28, 1983)
After a rousing 75th anniversary celebration in 1979, the department was hit hard in a few short years with several major incidents. In the early morning of June 28th, 1983 a 100 foot long section of the I-95 Bridge over the Mianus River collapsed, killing three and turning the nation’s eye on Greenwich. This accident wreaked havoc with local traffic for several months until a new temporary span was erected; it was several years until the rehabilitation project was fully completed and the current bridge opened.
As a result of the growing number of fire calls due to automatic alarms had increased dramatically over a relatively short period of time, a townwide ‘mutual aid’ call system resulted in Sound Beach traveling well beyond its district. In December of 1984, a fire in Porricelli’s Cos Cob Food Mart burned for almost 12 hours and decimated the central business district of Cos Cob. Sound Beach units were present at the scene from shortly after the fire was discovered until the overhaul was completed a day later.
In the mid 1980’s, Old Greenwich lost several major sources of industry when the Electrolux factory on Forest Avenue closed as did Condec and Dorr Oliver. The Sound Beach Fire Department had relied on these companies’ workers to fill its rolls. As the economy changed, so did the membership and demographics of the department. More and more families moved away as their children graduated from local schools; Greenwich as a whole lost most of its blue collar industrial base. This change, along with more stringent requirements for training and an increasing number of hours required to meet new standards made it hard for generations of families to continue in the department.
SBVFD members participate in confined space rescue training
Around this time the Sound Beach Fire Department made a decision to focus its energies on becoming one of the first volunteer departments to develop a technical rescue program. Beginning with vehicle and machinery extrication training and basic rope rescue instruction the beginnings of such a program was established. In 1986 the department purchased a custom truck on an International chassis to replace the rapidly aging Squad. This became the first truck in the Town of Greenwich to be called a "Rescue" and was set up to carry the growing amount of specialized equipment in addition to the ‘jaws-of-life’.
The weekend of December 11-13, 1992 brought about an icy ‘nor’easter’ that flooded most of the low-lying portions of Old Greenwich and coastal areas, forcing the evacuation of many residents by boat and heavy equipment. Sound Beach members worked around the clock for several days to evacuate residents and clear trees and debris. It was days (weeks in some cases) before much of the damage was cleared and all utilities restored to the area.
By the mid nineties, the Department had an established dive team and was training regionally with other departments in basic and advanced technical rescue skills including trench rescue and confined space skills. While the department no longer carried 100 members on the rolls, it had a base of highly trained firefighters who were capable of many tasks. This advancement continued with the purchase in 1994 of a larger Ford/E-One rescue to replace the overloaded smaller unit. The old rescue truck was refitted as ‘Tactical Support 51’ and currently serves as a support truck and secondary response unit.
New SBVFD members participate in live fire training
In 1999, a 1968 2 ½ ton ex-military ‘Deuce-and-a-half’ was added to the department as a trench rescue unit; this vehicle hauls the large panels needed for rescue operations along with lumber used to shore up structures during fires or building collapses. In addition to this, it can ford several feet of water and can be used to evacuated flooded areas should the need arise again. 2000 saw the arrival of two new pieces of apparatus; Engine 51, a 1983 Seagrave, was replaced with a Pierce 1500 GPM pumper and renamed Engine 5. Ladder 5, the 1973 American LaFrance, was replaced with a Pierce 100’ aerial ladder.
On September 11th, 2001 the Technical Rescue Team was mobilized and our rescue units were staged at Yonkers Raceway for several hours along with other agencies from surrounding municipalities.
After 9/11, a broader focus on Urban Search & Rescue (USAR) and further specialized training led to the creation of Connecticut’s Department of Homeland Security and Connecticut Task Force 1, which is in the process of certification as a Federal Emergency Management Agency USAR Team. Many SBVFD members serve on CT-TF1.
In 2004 the department replaced the company-owned 1979 Pierce with a town-owned Pierce 1500 GPM pumper. ‘Engine 51’ is the newest truck in our fleet. In addition to the front line apparatus the department maintains several pieces of specialized equipment including an inflatable boat, a heavy cutting trailer and a support trailer.
The last hundred-plus years have seen a remarkable change in the direction of the department. The support of our community has allowed the Sound Beach Volunteer Fire Department to prove many times that foresight, adaptability, training, and hard work can provide the community with a dependable organization capable of handling almost any emergency.