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Vintage Chicago 3-11 Alarm fire, 11-21-63 (more)

More from Steve Redick on the Vintage Chicago 3-11 Alarm fire, 11-21-63

 

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Tags: 3-11 Alarm fire in Chicago 11-21-63, Chicago 3-11 Alarm fire 11-21-63, chicagoareafire.com, fire destroys Mr Adams restaurant in Chicago, undated vintage news clipping of a 3-11 Alarm fire in Chicago

This entry was posted on June 1, 2020, 8:38 PM and is filed under Fire Department History, Historic Fire Photo, vintage news clipping of a fire. You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

5 Comments

• #1 by Mike Mc on June 4, 2020 - 10:30 PM

  

  Thanks for the info Bill. I believe the reason for so many firehouses being within walking distances is because many of them were constructed before motorized apparatus and horses could only run for 3/4 of a mile at a fast trot. Chicago did have a lot of single truck houses. Possibly more than any other city in the country. They would be strategically located to follow multiple engines on stills. Truck 24, for example, followed 73, 121 (Truck 40 was originally at 127), 93, and 121. They remained long after the horses were gone because the wooden tillers were extremely long and could not fit in some nearby engine houses and some nearby engines couldn’t fit into the truck house. Truck 30 is a good example. Engine 51 did not move in there until Truck 30 got a Mack-Magirus in the early 1960’s. The old squads may have been another factor. Most of them were in single engine houses such as 2, 22, 34, 42, 43, 61, 66, 83, and 93.

• #2 by Chuck on June 4, 2020 - 1:37 PM

  

  I worked for a guy several years ago whose dad was on the job from 1936 to 1964, and when he retired he was the Captain of Engine 79.

• #3 by Bill Post on June 4, 2020 - 12:27 AM

  

  Chuck, thanks for the correction. I was trying to say that it was Truck 47 that was northeast of Engine 79.

• #4 by Chuck on June 3, 2020 - 4:43 PM

  

  One minor correction – 79’s House was southwest of Truck 47, not northeast.

• #5 by Bill Post on June 3, 2020 - 2:53 PM

  

  That photo of the fire at Wilson and Broadway is interesting. I can identify the truck next to Snorkel 2 as being a 1949 FWD tractor which was Truck 22’s rig. In those days Truck 22 was alone at 1620 W West Winnemac about two blocks south of Ashland and Foster. Engine 79’s old station was on Ashland at Balmoral just two blocks north of Foster, not more then a mile northeast of Truck 47. Truck 22’s old station on Winnemac was less than a mile and half from five other houses including Truck 47 which was also a single truck house, Engine 110 and Truck 43’s station, Engine 128 and Battalion 20, and Engine 83 and Squad 4’s house.

  While there were many fire stations close to each other in the loop area, that was also true in quite a few other sections of the city including Uptown, Andersonville, Edgewater, and Lincoln Square. Many of those stations were only about a 10 to 15 minute walk from each other. I could name several other areas in Chicago with stations that were less then one to two miles from each other and within walking distance.

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