Port Townsend's Historic Fire Bell Tower

JEFFERSON COUNTY HISTORICAL Society
Fire Bell Tower History

Historic photo of Bell Tower on bluff in background

Bell Tower on hill (top left)

The present fire bell is the last of at least two which served the community through the years. The first was mounted on a small tower at the corner of Adams and Jefferson but had to be moved when the street was graded. (Just visible at the top of the Adams Street stairs.)

Port Townsend's Fire Bell Tower is a 75-ft. wooden structure built in 1890 to hold a 1,500 lb. brass bell and the city's new $900 fire engine. Uptown needed a fire station because horse-drawn equipment was too heavy to haul up the steep grade from the downtown fire station.

The January 1, 1890, issue of the Morning Leader reported:

The contract has been let for a new engine house for the chemical engine and bell tower on Tyler and Jefferson Streets. The bell tower will be 50 feet high, and it is presumed by the thinking part of the community that an electric light will be suspended from the lofty superstructure which being on the hill will shine to splendid advantage.

The number of rings was designed to inform volunteers what area the fire was in and the sequence could be repeated up to three times. This was handled by an ingenious remote-controlled device located in the fire hall.

An article in The Leader under the date of February 5, 1942, reported that the tower was becoming unstable and consideration was being given to replacing the bell with a whistle.

By 1950, demolition was considered due to the structure's poor condition. However, the Jefferson County Historical Society was able to complete emergency repairs. But by 1970, it was again in danger of collapse. A major drive was undertaken to raise the $9,500 necessary to replace the four supporting legs and other needed repairs. Appeals were made for individual and group donations. Port Townsend and surrounding communities cooperated in fundraising through auctions, lectures, dinners, etc.

Once again, proving that history does indeed repeat itself, JCHS mounted a campaign to raise funds for major restoration of the historic Bell Tower, this time the cost was nearly $300,000. In March 2004, the Washington State Office of Archaeology and Historic Preservation (OAHP) named Port Townsend's Fire Bell Tower, restored by the Jefferson County Historical Society and the City of Port Townsend, as the recipient of the 2004 State Historic Preservation Officer's Award for Resource Stewardship.

EARLY FIRE FIGHTING EQUIPMENT

Early equipment included an American LaFrance steam pumper, a horse-drawn hook and ladder wagon, chemical engine and a number of hose carts. Apparently there was also an auxiliary station on Harrison Street. Since the pumper was fueled with coal, supplies of this were kept at various locations, as were the hose carts.

Just prior to World War I the first self-propelled equipment went into service, a Moreland hose truck and a Model T fire engine.

By 1929, a Mack joined the fleet. For its day this was a formidable piece of equipment with its 1,000 gallons per minute pump. It remained in local service until the 1950s and then saw duty at Port Ludlow.

In 1941, a Howard Cooper Corp. rig built on a Chevrolet chassis was added, followed by other equipment, including a 1946 aerial ladder truck. Recent major additions occurred in 1988 and 1989. A Sutphen pumper and a 90-foot aerial tower truck now form the backbone of equipment.

THE Fire Bell Tower and
the Port Townsend Fire Department

The Port Townsend Fire Department had its beginnings prior to the 1890s, but its earliest official records begin in 1889. Key City (Enterprise) Hose Company No. 1 began operation in a wooden station house on the back of a downtown brewery between Madison and Monroe Streets.

Its antecedents go back even earlier. Apparently the first organized group was formed by John T. Norris, a local tinsmith and hardware dealer, under the name of Fire Rescue Unit No. 1. By 1880, it became an official municipal organization which assumed the group's assets as well as debts of $530. The department was in the rented space until completion of the City Hall in 1892 where it remained for the next 66 years.

Port Townsend's first Fire Chief was D.H. Hill, and his legion of volunteers were equipped with a horse-drawn Silsby hose cart. It was soon apparent that the fire department was in need of two things: an engine house for their new $900 chemical engine, and a method of alerting Hill and his "fire boys" to the alarm of a fire. At the suggestion of Hill's son N.D. Hill, these were combined in a bell tower and station structure that was built on a bluff at the intersection of Tyler and Jefferson Streets.

This "top of the bluff' location enabled the fire department to avoid scaling the steep grades each time there was an alarm in the uptown district of the rapidly growing city.

Key City Hose Company No. 2 was established in 1892, and operated from an uptown residence at the corner of Garfield and Harrison Streets. George Lake was the "driver" of the station's hose cart that was hand-drawn by the volunteers. As many as ten men could pull the cart, and one man was quoted as saying that he "never ran so fast in his life" as the time he helped pull the hose cart to a fire!

In October of 1889, the American Telegraph Company was given authority to erect poles and string wires, the poles to be equipped with boxes containing signaling devices for the transmission of fire alarms.

The new City Hall was dedicated on July 4, 1892. Included as part of the structure was a new fire station, complete with the traditional brass pole. The new station was soon equipped with an American steam fire engine. This apparatus was horse-drawn and capable of pumping 1,500 gallons of water per minute.

The Silsby hose cart was then housed in the newly completed Bell Tower. Hose Company No. 2 remained at its uptown residential location.

FIRE ALARM SYSTEM

A fire alarm box on the telephone pole (lower right) across the street from the Wanamaker & Mutty Grocery Store, later Aldrich's.

In 1889, the City made improvements to the fire alarm system. This equipment shows the very early use of electricity in communication. Gamewell, Co. "Excelsior" model street-side fire alarm boxes were installed at strategic public access locations throughout the City. By 1933 twenty-one such boxes were in service. Next to the box was a small case with a glass front. When a fire was detected, one would break the glass and remove a key to open the box. Inside the box was a small lever one pulled, which lifted an iron weight. This weight furnished the energy that turned a number of gears. The gears turned a small cog with raised points acting as a telegraph key sending out a coded signal down the wire to the downtown firehouse.

A Gamewell Co. "indicator unit" and "code-wheel transmitter" was also installed in the downtown firehouse. Once an alarm box signal was received, the indicator box used the signal in different ways. First, it rang the attached 14-inch brass bell in a timed pattern. Second, this signal was decoded and the specific alarm box number was displayed clearly on the front of the indicator unit. Lastly, the decoded signal was sent to a "Paper Tape" unit to record the code number. Firefighters arriving at the fire hall after the bell had stopped, only had to look at the indicator, check the number, and rush off to the location of the fire.

Without telephone or radio to inform the volunteer firefighters of the location of the fire, only the firefighters at the fire station knew of the location. The fire bell at the Bell Tower was thus used to sound the alarm all over town.

Using the number on the indicator, a Bell Ringer unit was used to transmit to the Bell Tower the coded location of the pull-box alarm. Selecting one of dozens of coin-shaped gears, each numbered corresponding to the alarm box numbers, and placing the gear in the bell ringer unit mechanism accomplished this. One would then select the number of times the bell ringer should cycle the coded signal, that is, whether it be a one, two, or three alarm fire.

Because this equipment was very primitive, wires having poor insulation, and that gears would often stick, a strange number sequence required some form of backup alarm verification. A Paper Tape unit (mechanical paper punch device) was used to record the decoded signal from the indicator unit.