WFRS Apparatus Histories - Windsor Fire & Rescue Services

Factory-fresh 1948 LaFrance arrives at WFD Headquarters. - WMC Collection

Old Engine 6’s Last Run

Old soldiers never die, it is said, but sadly, just like all worn-out passenger cars and trucks, most old fire engines are eventually hauled off to…

100 Years of Motorized Apparatus

Windsor First Motor Pumper - 1914 Seagrave. - Walt McCall Collection An important historical milestone was passed in mid-April, 2014. It was exactly 100 years ago…

Rebuilding Engine No. 5

On August 31, 1963, the Windsor Fire Department’s Engine No. 5 – a 1952 Bickle-Seagrave 1050 gpm pumper – was extensively damaged in a collision with…

The Luverne Rescue Squad

It’s a long way from sunny Phoenix, Arizona to Canada’s southernmost city, but one of the more interesting rigs to see service with the Windsor Fire…

Engine 1A, the 1995 Carl Thibault/Spartan CAFS Pumper

The Cafs Pumper

In late 1995, Windsor Fire & Rescue Services took delivery of a new triple combination pumper with a difference. Built by Carl Thibault Ltd. of Drummondville,…

Back to Red: 1993 Carl Thibault Pumper

In November, 1974, the Windsor Fire Department took delivery of its first lime-yellow rig – a 1050 IGPM pumper built by King-Seagrave Ltd of Woodstock, Ontario…

2000 Sausbury/Spartan ESU - Emergency Services Unit

The Saulsbury E.S.U.

During the summer of 2000, the Windsor Fire & Rescue Service took delivery of three new pieces of apparatus built by a well-known American fire apparatus…

The Custom-Built 1985 Orion Incident Command Centre

Windsor’s Mobile Command Posts

In the good old days, it wasn’t hard to find the Chief Engineer on the fireground -- he was the commanding figure in the white helmet…

Windsor’s Early Hose Wagons

For more than 200 years, hose – that highly portable, flexible means of getting water onto the fire – has been the most important basic tool…

Thinking Small: The W.F.D.’S Magic Wagon

In November 1983, Chrysler Canada Ltd. launched production of a revolutionary new kind of passenger vehicle in its Windsor Assembly Plant. The first vehicles of their…

Horses Versus Horsepower: 1911 Contest Pits Motor Fire Apparatus Against Horse-Drawn Rig

Just over 100 years ago, the Windsor Fire Department participated in an epochal contest that pitted a horse-drawn fire wagon against a fast- emerging rival -…

Windsor’s First Ladder Truck

When Windsor was incorporated in 1854, most of the buildings in the bustling little town on the Canadian shore of the Detroit River were no more…

Walkerville Motorizes

Swallowed up by the City of Windsor in the 1935 municipal amalgamation that also absorbed the former communities of Sandwich and East Windsor, the thriving, affluent…

Windsor Fire Department Headquarters apparatus, May 1939. - Walt McCall Collection

W.F.D. Headquarters, 1939

Sometime in late May of 1939, a photographer – his name lost to time -- climbed to the roof of the bustling Windsor City Market on…

The Chief’s Buggy, Part 2

As noted in Part 1, the Windsor Fire Department purchased its first station wagon in 1961. The steel-bodied, four-door 1961 Chevrolet wagon was much more versatile…

The Chief’s Buggy

Ever since horses replaced manpower to pull fire apparatus, the Chief Engineer – or Fire Chief in today’s vernacular -- has traditionally sped to fires in…

Unit #3 - the 1964 LaFrance/Mercury 100' Quint

The Suburbs – Riverside’s Rigs

In its half-century of existence the Riverside Fire Department utilized just four pieces of motor fire apparatus. The small volunteer fire department’s first motorized fire truck…

W.F.D. “Television Stars” !

Windsor’s first television station – CKLW-TV – took to the airwaves in the fall of 1954. For many years Channel 9’s tall red-and-white-painted transmission tower behind…

The 1916 Menard City Service Ladder Truck

Windsor’s Four Menards

Well-known Windsor wagon maker Moise L. Menard began production of an automobile bearing his own name in 1908. Two years later Menard switched exclusively to truck…

Windsor Fire Dept.'s Marine 1 on the Detroit River, 1968

Marine 1: Windsor’s Fireboat

With an extensive, heavily built up Detroit River shoreline, Windsor has, for more than a century, relied on neighboring Detroit when a fireboat was needed to…

1935 Annexation Transforms W.F.D.

On July 1, 1935 the City of Windsor annexed the neighboring towns of Walkerville, Sandwich and East Windsor. This historic amalgamation drastically altered the size and…

Windsor: City Of Roses and Rosenbauers!

With the delivery of three new pumpers earlier this year, the Rosenbauer name became the most prolific on the Windsor Fire & Rescue Services current apparatus…

All five Sutphens in action at Holiday Inn fire, April 8, 1999

Windsor’s Sutphen Towers

Clarence Sutphen founded his fire equipment sales business in Columbus, Ohio in 1890. Mr. Sutphen added motor fire apparatus to his wares when he became a…

Last straight aerial purchased: 1982 Pierreville/Spartan 100'

A Century of “Sticks”

One hundred years ago, the Windsor Fire Department received its first aerial hook and ladder truck. Built by the W. E. Seagrave Fire Apparatus Company in…

Windsor’s Only Steam Fire Engine - featured

Windsor’s Only Steam Fire Engine – 1868 Amoskeag

The introduction of the first successful steam fire engine in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1852 revolutionized firefighting in North America, precipitating as it did the replacement of…

Windsor’s Civil Defense Pumpers

In the early 1950s – at the height of the Cold War scare – the Canadian federal and provincial Governments provided special funding to bolster the…

From Sandwich West

As noted in an earlier article, following the January 1, 1966 annexation of the former Town of Riverside and a portion of Sandwich West Township, the…

Ford City’s LaFrances

In the late summer of 1904 a bold, new industrial enterprise set up shop in the former Walkerville Wagon Works factory on Riverside Drive East near…

Windsor’s “Other” Rescue Squad

Following the annexation by Windsor of Riverside and a portion of Sandwich West Township on January 1, 1966 the Windsor Fire Department acquired half a dozen…

Sandwich’s Gotfredson

Sandwich Fire Department's 1927 Gotfredson-Bickle Ladder Truck In one of our very first articles in this series, we chronicled the remarkable, continuing history of a Gotfredson-Bickle…

The Hurricane Twins

In 1974, retired playground equipment maker Robert Wormser constructed a light-duty rescue unit in the garage of his Florida home. Buoyed by its success, he formed…

Windsor’s Pumpers: Engine No. 9 From Riverside

With the annexation of the former Town of Riverside on January 1, 1966, the Windsor Fire Department acquired three pieces of apparatus: a two-year-old LaFrance/Mercury 100-foot…

Riverside Pumper #1 late in its fire service career

1938 Bickle/Ford Parade Rig

With the January 1, 1966 annexation by the City of Windsor of the former Town of Riverside and portions of Sandwich East and Sandwich West Townships,…

Windsor’s Pumpers: The Seagrave Twins

After an absence of many years, the famed Seagrave nameplate returned to the Windsor Fire & Rescue Services apparatus roster in the early 1990s. Windsor’s first…

Windsor’s Pumpers: The First Spartans

In 1975, several former employees of the recently-closed Diamond-Reo truck manufacturing firm in Lansing, Michigan organized a new company in nearby Charlotte to make custom cab-forward…

Aerial Tower No. 2, 1982 Duke/Ford Hi-Ranger 85'

Windsor’s Second Snorkel: Aerial Tower No.2

Introduced in Chicago in 1958, the elevating platform – or Snorkel – revolutionized aerial firefighting in North America. The Windsor Fire Department received its first elevating…

Windsor’s Pumpers: The Pierreville Four

Although the Windsor fire Department had purchased two new pumpers in the early 1970s, the rest of the city’s pumper fleet was rapidly becoming antiquated. An…

1974 King/Ford: The Greening Of The W.F.D.

In 1970, a respected optometrist in Oswego, N.Y. released the results of a scientific study which concluded that yellow was a much more visible -- and…

First Of The Fords: Engine No. 10

In 1957, the Ford Motor Company introduced a new line of medium/heavy-duty trucks called the “C” Series. The new C-Series Ford’s rectangular, flat-faced cab tilted forward…

Windsor’s Pumpers: The Mack E-2

For most of the past century, the “big three” of the U.S. and Canadian fire apparatus industry were American-LaFrance, Seagrave - and Mack.Mack was unique among…

Windsor’s Pumpers: 1960 Pierre Thibault

By the mid-1950s, the Windsor Fire Department had pretty much completed its postwar modernization program. Following the delivery of a Bickle-Seagrave pumper in 1953, no more…

Engine #4, late in its career at Station #4, College Avenue

Windsor’s Pumpers: 1953 Bickle-Seagrave

In 1951, the Seagrave Corporation - and its Canadian subsidiary, Bickle-Seagrave Ltd. of Woodstock, Ontario - marked its 70th anniversary with the introduction of a totally…

Windsor’s Pumpers: 1952 Bickle-Seagrave

In 1951, The Seagrave Corporation of Columbus, Ohio -- and its Canadian cousin, Bickle-Seagrave Ltd. of Woodstock, Ontario -- marked Seagrave’s 70th anniversary as one of…

This is the factory portrait of the 1950 Bickle-Seagrave.

Windsor’s Pumpers: 1950 Bickle-Seagrave – Engine #3

As the nineteen-fifties began, Windsor’s pumper fleet was urgently in need of modernization. Most of the city’s front-line pumpers were wide-open, chain-drive relics of the 1920s.…

Rebuilt as Engine No. 6, 1964: Chief Ray May, District Chief Mike Koehl

Windsor’s Pumpers: 1948 American-LaFrance 700

Immediately following the Second World War, Windsor’s firefighting fleet was in dire need of modernization. The city’s last new pumper had been purchased in the mid-1920s,…

Sandwich's 1930 Bickle at the Woodstock factory

Windsor’s Pumpers: The Bickle Twins

Founded in Winnipeg in 1906 and relocated to Woodstock, Ontario in 1914, Bickle Fire Engines Ltd. was about as close to a purely Canadian motor fire…

Engine 1 handed over to HVSO - May, 1959

Windsor’s Pumpers: The 1925 LaFrance

Of the four chain-drive American-LaFrance pumpers which served the Windsor Fire Department from the 1920s through the 1950s, the last one purchased had the most colorful,…

Engine No. 1, the 1925 LaFrance Type 45, shortly before donation to a local antique car club in 1959

Windsor’s Pumpers: The Chain-Drive LaFrances

In 1914, the American-LaFrance Fire Engine Company of Elmira, N.Y. opened a Canadian subsidiary plant and office in Toronto. Founded in 1904 with roots extending all…

Windsor’s Rescue Squads Part 6 “The Saulsbury”

Three-quarters of a century later, one can only wonder what the members of Windsor’s very first rescue squad would think of Rescue 3 - Windsor’s current…

Windsor’s Rescue Squads Part 5 - featured image

Windsor’s Rescue Squads Part 5 – Tilt-Cab Fords

Purchased in the mid-1960s and early `70s, Windsor’s two rescue squad trucks were due for replacement as the 1980s began. Squad 1’s 1967 Chevrolet and Squad…

Windsor’s Rescue Squads Part 4

Since the formation of its first emergency life-saving squad in the early 1930s, the Windsor Fire Department’s rescue squad had always responded to alarms out of…

Windsor’s Rescue Squads Part 3 – “The Bug” (continued)

After nearly 17 years of hard urban fire service, “The Bug” was simply wearing out. The fleet-footed 1940 Ford had already been through two flathead V8…

Windsor’s Rescue Squads Part 2 – “The Bug”

Most of the current members of the Windsor Fire & Rescue Services won’t recognize this colorful nickname, but just mention “The Bug” to any longtime Windsor…

Windsor’s Rescue Squads Part 1

Just over a century ago, in the latter part of 1906, the Springfield, Massachusetts Fire Department placed the first “Flying Squadron” into service. Using a locally-built…

Aerial No. 4A – the 1981 Thibault-Spartan

Aerial Ladder Trucks – Part 8

"THE QUEBEC TWINS " By the late 1970s, the years were again catching up to Windsor’s hard-working aerial ladder fleet. More than a decade had passed…

Aerial Ladder Trucks – Part 7

"THE SNORKEL" Strolling back to his office after lunch one day in 1957, Chicago Fire Commissioner Robert J. Quinn paused to watch some city tree-trimmers at…

Aerial Ladder Trucks – Part 6

1967 LaFRANCE-INTERNATIONAL By the mid-1960s, Windsor’s aerial ladder fleet was beginning to show its age. Aerial No. 1A - a 1936 American-LaFrance - had been in…

Aerial Ladder Trucks – Part 5

THE RIVERSIDE QUINT The Quintuple Combination - or “Quint” - is the Swiss Army Knife of fire trucks. As its numerical name implies, the versatile “quint”…

The Junior Aerial in action at the Bowman-Anthony Co. fire on Benjamin St., May 21, 1967

Aerial Ladder Trucks – Part 4

THE "JUNIOR" AERIAL Two basic types of aerial ladder trucks dominated the North American fire service for most of the 20th century – the tractor-trailer tillered…

Truck No. 2A in action at the Kohen Box Company fire on University Avenue W. on March 11, 1967

Aerial Ladder Trucks – Part 3

“THE PIRSCH” The Second World War was finally over, and Windsor was again basking in peacetime prosperity. Because it had been an important centre for war…

Aerial No. 1A, right, in action at Adelman’s clothing store fire on Chatham St. East on December 14, 1948

Aerial Ladder Trucks – Part 2

By the mid-1930s - twenty-five years after it had been delivered - Windsor’s first aerial ladder truck was clearly showing its age. Built in 1910, the…

Walkerville Aerial No. 1’s wrecked Gotfredson tractor after fatal crash on Walker Road, 1927

Aerial Ladder Trucks – Part 1

Over a period of seventy-two years, the Windsor Fire Department acquired a total of nine conventional aerial ladder trucks – seven purchased by the city and…

Windsor’s City Service Ladder Trucks

Before there were aerial ladder trucks and firefighting elevating platforms, there was the City Service Ladder Truck. Visualize, if you can, an aerial truck without the…

“Old Mike” – Windsor’s First Motor Pumper

“Old Mike” – Windsor’s First Motor Pumper Purchased in 1914, Windsor’s first motor-driven pumper was also one of the first automobile pumping engines placed in service…

Old Mike 2

Old Mike 2 Engine No. 2 was the pride of the Windsor Fire Department for the next five years -- until it was displaced as our…

The Elcombe

You’ve seen it in parades and at other community events, and perhaps you’ve even ridden on it -- but what the heck is the Elcombe, anyway?…

Hose No. 1

Perhaps the least used piece of front-line motor fire apparatus in Windsor Fire & Rescue Service history was a barely-remembered, single-purpose hose truck purchased during the…