This from Mike Summa for #TBT:
For TBT-The company that changed the American fire service. For years the most recognized fire apparatus. Its demise will be debated for years. Here are some samples from a late 1970’s catalog. Enjoy.Mike Summa
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#1 by Jim Johnson on January 18, 2020 - 3:12 PM
Danville il had one of those custom ALF.
#2 by John on January 17, 2020 - 3:36 PM
The ALF pic under “Customs” was a real thing,called the Spartan II. They only produced them for a couple of years,starting in 1979. I have never seen nor heard of it before now.
#3 by John on January 10, 2020 - 8:14 PM
Admin,I was referring to Mike’s question about the squared off cab rather than the brochure pic.
#4 by Admin on January 10, 2020 - 9:49 PM
gotcha
Pingback: American LaFrance Fire Apparatus history (more) « chicagoareafire.com
#5 by Phil Stenholm on January 9, 2020 - 9:22 PM
The American Fire Engine Company (AFEC) was created in 1891 from a merger of four of the largest steam fire engine manufacturers (Ahrens, Button, Clapp & Jones, and Silsby). This was the era of monopolies and trusts, and the purpose of establishing AFEC was to reduce (or maybe even eventually eliminate) competition and consolidate the sales force (and maximize profits), although each of the four companies would maintain their own “corporate identity.”
AFEC production facilities were located at the Ahrens Manufacturing Company plant in Cincinnati and at the Silsby Manufacturing Company plant in Seneca Falls, N. Y. However, because the other two major steam fire engine manufacturers (Amoskeag and LaFrance) did not participate in the merger, the overall benefit of the AFEC consolidation was minimal.
While there were four steam fire engine manufactures under the AFEC umbrella, Ahrens was the biggest and most-successful one. Ahrens built the popular “Metropolitan” model steamer in various sizes, as well as the radical/eccentric and overly-heavy (and thus not very successful) “Columbian,” which was built for and displayed at the World’s Columbian Exposition at Jackson Park in Chicago in 1893, and featured both a standard steam engine AND hose supply-bed on the same rig (the common practice both before and after the introduction of the Columbian was for an engine company to operate with a steam fire engine and a hose cart running as separate rigs).
While the American Fire Engine Company was trying to establish itself as the “big dog” in the manufacturing of steam fire engines, the LaFrance Fire Engine Company of Elmira, N. Y. was acquiring both the Hayes Manufacturing Company (which manufactured the most-popular horse-drawn aerial ladder truck of the 19th century) and the Babcock Company of Chicago (manufacturers of the horse-drawn chemical-engine as well as portable chemical fire extinguishers)
It was not until 1900 — when the American Fire Engine Co. merged with LaFrance, Amoskeag, and a number of other manufacturers of firefighting equipment and apparatus such as the Rumsey Company, the Fire Extinguisher Manufacturing Company (FEMCO), Gleason & Bailey, the Charles T. Holloway Company, and the Macomber Fire Extinguisher Company to form the International Fire Engine Company — name changed to American-LaFrance Fire Engine Company and all production moved to the LaFrance plant in Elmira, N. Y. in 1904 — that the trust was fully established.
Unfortunately for American-LaFrance (and like AFEC ten years earlier), post-merger profits were not as great as had been anticipated.
While the Seagrave Corporation did not build horse-drawn steam fire engines, it did manufacture chemical engines and hook & ladder trucks, as well as the popular “combination truck” (chemical fire-engine/hook & ladder truck combined in one apparatus) that was in service with fire departments across the U. S. in the 1890’s (most of the Chicago Fire Department’s truck companies located outside the central downtown area operated with horse-drawn combination trucks well into the 1900’s) before beginning to manufacture horse-dawn aerial-ladder trucks (that competed successfully with the LaFrance-Hayes aerial-ladder truck) in 1900.
And then Chris Ahrens — the founder of the Ahrens Manufacturing Company — sold his share in American-LaFrance in 1904 and together with sons John and Fred and son-in-law Charles H. Fox (the Chief of the Cincinnati Fire Department) formed a new company called the Ahrens Fire Engine Company (named changed to the Ahrens-Fox Fire Engine Company when Charles Fox became company president in 1908) at the old Ahrens manufacturing plant in Cincinnati, and Ahrens-Fox quickly became the #2 steam fire engine manufacturer and American-LaFrance’s chief competitor in the area of steam fire engines.
But because American-LaFrance retained all patents held by the various companies that formed ALF, Ahrens-Fox could not build the “Metropolitan” (the most-popular steam fire engine of the day) even though it was invented by Chris Ahrens, and so instead (out of necessity) developed and built a completely new steam fire engine called the “Continental,” and it sold very well and might have matched ALF’s Metropolitan in popularity except the steam fire engine era suddenly came to an end.
By 1910 steam fire engines and other horse-drawn appliances manufactured by American-LaFrance, Ahrens-Fox, and Seagrave were being replaced with motorized automobile fire apparatus, and the two companies initially at the forefront in the production of automobile pumpers (Webb and Robinson) were not controlled by American-LaFrance or Ahrens-Fox.
And then once American-LaFrance and Ahrens-Fox started building automobile fire engines (featuring rotary pumps) in 1914, Seagrave (which had built horse-drawn aerial-ladder trucks and combination rigs but did not build horse-drawn steam fire engines) started manufacturing an automobile pumper that featured a centrifugal pump that was very popular with fire departments, and combining that with its own one and two-axle automobile tractors that could pull formerly horse-drawn steamers and aerial ladder trailers, Seagrave became the #1 producer of automobile fire engines, aerial-ladder trucks, the combination chemical engine/hose truck, and tractors by 1920.
However, American-LaFrance (which like Seagrave built pumpers, aerial-ladder trucks, chemical engines, hose wagons, and tractors) and Ahrens-Fox (which mainly built just pumpers) did OK, too, just not quite as well as Seagrave.
What helped Ahrens-Fox (in particular) stay in the automobile pumper market (besides its unusual but highly reliable front-mounted pump) was the “booster system” invented by Charles Fox in 1914. The Ahrens-Fox booster system included a booster pump, water-tank, and hose reel that replaced the chemical tank on automobile pumpers built by Ahrens-Fox. (Because of patent issues, Seagrave and American-LaFrance were unable to replace chemical tanks with water booster systems until the 1920’s).
#6 by John on January 9, 2020 - 8:29 PM
Mike L,in 1974 ALFs parent company ATO purchased Snorkel Fire Equipment. ALF discontinued the Aero Chief boom,and started using Snorkels. And the square one you refer to was the Pioneer.They also made the Pacemaker,which used a Cincinnati cab.
#7 by Admin on January 9, 2020 - 10:41 PM
actually that’s not the Pioneer. Glenbrook purchased three Pioneer cabs which had a slanted windshield
#8 by CrabbyMilton on January 9, 2020 - 11:48 AM
I second that. I have a few brochures from the mid 1980’s and yes, it was an iconic apparatus builder along with SEAGRAVE which happily survives. ALF had a long history of embedded quality problems that never seemed to be resolved thru many ownership changes.
#9 by Mike L on January 9, 2020 - 9:45 AM
Great post, Mike!!! The picture under “Customs” was never produced as it’s drawn. I forget the chassis (Metropolitan?) That had a squared off cab but it didn’t have flared out sides as depicted. Also interesting is the push for articulating snorkel products when they made their own articulating boom; several of which were purchased in the Metro Chicago region. Thanks again for posting!!!