Emergency Fire Box

This is a fire alarm pull box. This one is an outdoor device used for notifying a fire department of a fire. Wikipedia states that Early boxes... more

by Denyse Duhaime

Title

Emergency Fire Box

Artist

Denyse Duhaime

Medium

Photograph - Photography

Description

This is a fire alarm pull box. This one is an outdoor device used for notifying a fire department of a fire. Wikipedia states that " Early boxes used the telegraph system and were the main method of calling the fire department to a neighborhood in the days before people had telephones. When the box is triggered, a spring-loaded wheel spins and taps out a signal onto the fire alarm telegraph wire, indicating the box number. The receiver at a fire station then can match the number to the neighborhood. Unmanned or volunteer departments would instead have a Diaphone horn that sounded the box number. The boxes are a form of street furniture still in service in many places." You can see the number on this box. In our town they blow a horn, this on would be three, three, four, four, and we can all look it up to see what town or building the fire would be at. For volunteers they can respond to the fire location. May towns have done away with this type of alarm box.

Uploaded

May 7th, 2014