HELENA, Mont. (AP) — As Sean Logan stands atop the Guardian of
the Gulch, looking over the Queen City as his firefighter
predecessors once did a hundred and some odd years ago, he ponders
the symbolic meaning of the historic wooden structure.
While the fire tower is not manned around the clock as it once
was, the 25-foot lookout still serves as the city’s symbol.
“It still gives a commanding view of Helena,” Logan said. “It’s
a neat old structure. Its location has a lot of stories to
tell.”
Logan, too, has stories to tell. The fire captain has been
gathering these tales in order to piece together the history of the
tower and the Helena Fire Department.
Logan’s interest in the history of the department sparked 14
years ago when a former firefighter came by the station and dropped
off a portrait of about 20 firemen outside that same building
housed in the Civic Center in 1939.
“To me, you look in each of their faces and you can tell there
are great stories there,” Logan said. “It gives me a connection to
these guys who were there before. I want to find out their
stories.”
Logan, who was then in his first year as a firefighter,
interviewed two of the men from the photo and decided to trace the
department’s history. It has been his project ever since.
The journey started with the interviews of retired Capt. Thomas
Williams, who dropped off the photo, and John Brockway, who retired
as fire chief after serving from 1937 to 1973. Logan found out two
other firefighters in the photo were still alive.
“We got some great history from them that you otherwise wouldn’t
get,” Logan said.
After his initial burst of energy with the project, Logan became
sidetracked. That was, until April 2009, when he learned about the
death of another one of the four men — Bob Richeson, who was chief
from 1963 to 1965. Logan had missed his opportunity to learn from a
primary source and glean Richeson’s recollection about the
history.
“It was kind of a kick in the rear to get back into this,” he
said.
Since then, Logan has scoured books and newspapers looking for
information. He has worked with the Montana Historical Society in
gathering old newspapers. Logan also has obtained historic photos
from descendants of former firefighters.
Last fall, Logan entered a classified ad in the Independent
Record and received a bit more information and photos.
“It surprised me what I found out in my little venture here,” he
said.
Logan pointed out across the way from perched atop the fire
tower to the site of the first fire station, about where Miller’s
Crossing sits today.
The fire tower was built in 1874 just up the hill from the
original hall. When a blaze erupted, the watchman would ring the
tower’s bell to alert the community. Fires were especially
horrendous back then because the buildings were made of wood and
were very tightly packed in the gold-rush town, Logan said.
Back then it was “bucket brigades” that put out the fires — or
tried to.
“It was buckets, literally buckets,” he said.
The technology advanced to a hand-operated pump, which took 16
to 20 firefighters to operate. They had to pump it back and forth
like a seesaw.
Several years later, the department bought a steam engine.
The next home for the Helena firefighters was a station built in
1885 at the corner of Main and State streets where the Lewis and
Clark Library is now.
In 1914, Helena got its first mechanized fire truck. Before
that, the responses were horse-drawn.
The fire tower was used up until the 1930s, when firefighters
would climb and ring the bell as a sign of curfew.
“You could have seen the whole town from right here,” Logan
said, surveying the 360-degree view of the Capital City. “It’s a
constant figure.”
By 1939, the department moved to its current home at the Civic
Center, which prior to that was an Algerian shrine temple. Forty
years later, Station Two on the east side of town was added.
Helena firefighters have kept some remnants of the older days
intact, including the same brass pole from the old State Street
station. Someone had saved it for 40 years and when a new addition
to the current station was built in the 1970s, it was
installed.
“It has been really quite a trip for me. I’ve met a lot of nice
people who have been very giving of artifacts,” Logan said.
Some of his cohorts don’t understand Logan’s interest in
history.
“I know I’m part of something that’s essentially been alive for
140 years,” he said. “I’ve got a long ways to go. I’m afraid that
I’m not going to find out.”
Logan plans to continue his historical digging for the next few
years. He hopes to talk with more firefighters’ families about
their ancestry. He is not sure what he’ll do with it all when he’s
done — maybe write a book or simply create a Facebook page.
“It’s something that needs to be told,” he said.
In May, the catalyst for all of Logan’s searching passed away.
Williams died at the age of 101.
The death served as another reminder to Logan about the
importance of his mission.
“I want to get the stories down before they’re gone,” he said.
“I have a lot of questions I want to find out the answers to before
I become part of history.”
