Top Hats to Tupperware: Fire Helmet History

At the tender age of three, most youngsters can identify a firefighter.  Even with the myriad colors, shapes, and styles today, the helmet, going back almost 200 years is synonymous with the job.  The first fire helmets, hats really, would hardly be identified as such today.  They resembled top hats, Lincolnesque in style, but with a band or painting to identify the company the individual belonged to more so than to provide protection. 

Jacob or Jacobus Turck is generally credited with this design from around 1740.  This lasted around 100 years until Henry T. Gratacap designed a new helmet constructed of hardened leather sections for protection and a large rear tail to help shed water.  Although changes and improvements have been made, the shape of this original design from around 1836 (dates differ) is the one even children could recognize today. 

Gratacap’s operation continued to grow and in 1869, he sold it to two brothers; Jasper and Henry Cairns, who possessed a last name which is arguably the most well known in the helmet business today.  Cairns brothers continued to evolve the designs and materials, but the leather helmet remained a core component of their business.  In 1937, Cairns introduced an aluminum helmet.  A generation later, in 1962, their vacuum formed polycarbonate helmet line began; and in the “modern” era, Philadelphians, Phoenix, and Metro helmets were among the new style that some saw as a radical change from the classic shape.  But it was radical only at first glance as even these helmets retained the short front brim and longer rear tail.  Helmet types and styles have developed fans and detectors over the years.  Leather helmet devotees sometimes disparage the plastic models as “Tupperware.”

Aluminum Helmet

 

Cairns Metro Helmet

Although safety standards have dramatically changed the interior, the exterior of a leather helmet manufactured today, as well as the classically shaped plastic versions, would no doubt be recognizable by Henry Gratacap or the original Cairns brothers.  In a world where change seems to be the only constant, that the basic design of the fire helmet could remain intact for 177 years is nothing short of amazing. 

Gifford Pinchot and Forest Fires: The Early Battles

Most of the focus on fighting forest fires; the tools, techniques, and tactics, have long been on the West.  The beginnings, though, came from one of our own; a Pennsylvanian.  Gifford Pinchot, who served two terms as Governor, headed the Forest Service in the early 1900s, starting under President McKinley, and through the administration of his friend and supporter, Theodore Roosevelt.  In the early days, Pinchot was a Forester with no forest, as control of the actual Federal land was in the General Land Office.  Finally, in 1905, Roosevelt was able to out maneuver the land barons' both in and outside of Congress, and transfer control of the forests to Pinchot’s agency, the newly named United States Forest Service. 

The danger of fire was one of the ways in which Pinchot convinced a reluctant Congress to fund his corps of green shirted rangers.  The danger was not illusory.  In 1871, the Pestigo fire in Wisconsin burned over a million acres and killed 1,182 people.  In Minnesota in 1894, another tragic fire struck which killed 413 people.  Pinchot knew that fire was necessary and in some cases beneficial to forests and understood that nature could never be completely controlled.  His fire control efforts started a debate which continues to this day as to where to draw that line. 

The rangers on the front lines were highly motivated by poorly paid; a miserable salary even for the day of $900 per year.  Pinchot’s directions to them on fighting fires were simple.  As he told the New York Times, “the one secret to fighting fires is to discover your fire as soon as possible and fight it as hard as you can and refuse to leave it until the last ember is dead.”  The Forest Service had some successes in their first two summers as only one tenth of one percent (0.1%) of Forest Service land burned each year.  There were bad years as well, however. 

One of the assistant rangers hired in the Bitterroot area was Ed Pulaski.   He was older than most of the Yale Forestry program graduates initially hired by Pinchot, but a skilled outdoorsman.  The man himself, who died in 1931, is little known, but his name lives on as the inventor of the tool still in use today—the Pulaski tool. 

 

Successors to Pinchot such as Bill Greeley took his concerns and tactics on fire and elevated them in priority increasing the Forest Service role in prevention and suppression efforts.  The debate continues over the proper level of these, but forgotten by many is that man with who it began, Pennsylvanian Gifford Pinchot. 

Old School Trench Rescue

Back in the late 1970s, the wonderful world of trench rescue training with its shoring work and special equipment was in its infancy.  In my area, it hadn’t even yet been conceived.  Hell, Johnny and Roy were the cutting edge of fire rescue as far as we were concerned.   

We were dispatched for a man injured in an excavation behind the local junior high school.  When we arrived in the old Chevy Suburban ambulance, we found a male laying at the bottom of about a six foot deep trench.  Part of the wall had come in on him and he complained of hip/pelvis pain. 

Not knowing any better, we jumped right in with him and started to clear some of the dirt away by hand and with some shovels that the other workers had.  We were smart enough to request fire department assistance, and the arriving engine company, no smarter than us, helped with an attic ladder for access and more hand tools.  It was like being an archeologist, as the land where they were digging was an old landfill, and we were working on a couple of layers of antique trash. 

Once we had the dirt off him, the real fun started.  We had to get him immobilized to lift from the trench.  We had nothing to work with but the basics we carried on the ambulance; no stokes basket, and certainly no modern strap system.  We had a full backboard and cravats.  For the uninitiated, i.e. younger than 45 years of age, cravats are folded triangular bandages.  Part of the EMT curriculum at the time was to be able to completely immobilize a victim to a long board so that when the board was stood up vertically, the victim did not move using nothing more than these big handkerchiefs.  It was something we practiced for hours at a time.  Now we had to do it for real. 

As you can imagine, it’s not a speedy method, but we got to work, square knot after square knot.  Finally done, it was the moment of truth.  We stood the backboard up with the ladder behind it to slide him up.  He didn’t move a bit.  With the assistance of the engine company, up the ladder he went and onto terra firma for transport. 

Luckily nothing bad had happened—to any of us.  The walls of this trench, made up of landfill material, were far from stable, but we were protected in our ignorance.   The old days were not always better…

The Professional Voluneer

In a recent speech, President Obama paid homage to the firefighters in West, Texas who lost their lives in the explosion and fire at a fertilizer plant.  In doing so, he actually insulted a large percentage of volunteer firefighters; out of ignorance, one hopes, and not purposely.   The assignment of the term “professional” to career firefighters and departments has always struck a sore spot with me.  The President’s remarks compounded this feeling.  It is good to know I’m not the only one.  The National Volunteer Fire Council sent a letter to the President on April 30^th protesting these remarks. 

A simple check of the dictionary points out the fallacy of the common usage.  One of the definitions is “a person who is expert at his or her work.”  Another references “a vocation requiring knowledge of…learning or science.”  Nowhere in these admittedly selective definitions is there a mention of financial compensation. 

Professionalism isn’t about pay, it’s about attitude.  It’s about your approach to a job.  There are volunteers who join departments for all the wrong reasons and there are career personnel for whom the job is nothing but a paycheck.  However, there are many truly professional firefighters, officers, and chiefs in the volunteer ranks which should be recognized as such. 

Coming up on April 28th

Old School Rescue: A History Lesson

Back just a couple of years in firefighter time, in 1877, following a tragic fatal fire at the Southern Hotel, the St. Louis Fire Department established the first Pompier Corps.   Christopher Hoell, a German immigrant, and Zero Marx lead the unit and taught climbing and rescue skills to other departments across the country. 

They used specially developed scaling ladders, a belt with a large hook, which modern (hopefully) descendants of remain in service in many departments to this day, and ropes.  These ladders were not simple to use, but provided access to buildings blocked by wires or trees, and to elevations above that which could be reached by aerial ladders.  Multiple pompier ladders could be used, which with rope, provided a way to get hose lines to upper floors. 

The top of the ladder, with its iron catch, would be hooked over a window sill, and the firefighter would climb the narrow rungs to the window.  He would stand on the sill and pull the ladder up and raise it to the next window and repeat the process. 

This required considerable dexterity, strength, balanced, and a large dose of intestinal fortitude, to use polite terminology.  These ladders remained a presence on at least some ladder trucks for almost a century and hang in many fire houses today as a reminder of a storied past. 

Ernest Hemingway, Poetry, and Firefighting: Yes They Do Go Together

One skill that all firefighters have in abundance is the ability to complain.  That’s not a criticism, but simply a statement of fact.  Rather than go down that road, at least right now, I want to talk about one heartening thing I see in the fire service today;  a group of younger firefighters who are smart, aggressive, respectful of tradition, but progressive in outlook.  I wish this group was bigger than it is, but there is room for growth. 

These troops make up what I hope will become the leadership; the movers-and-shakers of the next generation.  They will have tremendous challenges to address, some of which only time will reveal. 

I want to offer some advice to this group, and most of it has nothing to do with the day to day application of wet stuff on red stuff. 

Let’s start with one of the basics, education; you need to get it.  Yes, you’re busy—some of you have a spouse and young kids.  They definitely need to come first, but it can be done, even if it is one course at a time.  Can’t see the end of the rainbow of a bachelor’s degree because of the number of credits?  Start with an Associates.  Get that done and you’re halfway home.  The question I hear is why? “I can take the fire science or emergency planning classes that interest me.  I don’t need the History, English, Science and other stupid stuff like that for this job.  I didn’t like that crap in high school.  Why should I take it now just to get a piece of paper? “

There are a couple of reasons.  The first, and probably less important is perception.  The more bugles on your collar, the more individuals with degrees you will be dealing with on a regular basis.  While not necessarily right, some of those people make snap judgments based on educational back ground.  If you don’t have one, you automatically start at a disadvantage with these folks.

“Well screw them; I’m just as smart as they are.”  Probably so, and maybe smarter—especially in your discipline, but perception is reality. 

The second and most important reason is that these “crap” courses teach you to think.  Taught correctly, history isn’t about memorizing dates and places.  It’s about looking at the past and trying to figure out what happened and why.  What were the variables that influenced an event?  How did people react?  Has the interpretation of something changed over time?  Any of this sound familiar? 

Science is a bit easier to understand.  Chemistry knowledge is useful for hazardous materials and we use physics, like it or not, on many rescue applications.  It takes math skills to do both the above. 

English; oh no, not that.  “I don’t want to waste my time sitting around reading poems or Ernest Hemingway.”  It isn’t about reading, it’s about writing.  But to learn how to write well, you need to read, and the more the better.  Virtually every successful writer will tell you reading is one of the most important things they did (and continue to do) which aids their writing.  The higher you go, the more important your writing skills will become.  If you don’t know the difference between there, their, and they’re, and I see this all the time; no one is going to take you seriously. 

The longer you are out of school, the more difficult it can be to motivate yourself to start again and to remember (or develop) your study skills.  It really can be a great experience.  I went back to school for a Masters degree in my late 40s, and found it challenging…and one of the most enjoyable educational endeavors I ever undertook.  Believe it or not; learning and education should and can be a life long process.

On another topic, it may sound obvious, but you need to develop mentors.  There is a tremendous institutional memory available and ripe for the picking in the old breed firefighters.  This is, however, a perishable commodity.  Use it while it is still on the shelves.  You don’t have to agree with everything they tell you, but it costs nothing to listen.  It is amazing how much can be learned around the kitchen table. 

Develop relationships with ranking officers.  I don’t mean brown-nosing or ass kissing, but a true mutual respect two way street type deal.   Let them know you’re looking to learn, and interesting projects and assignments may come your way. 

Hemingway was an old guy.  Make him one of your mentors.  Follow even some of these suggestions, and the sky is the limit.