The City Council Seized Our Engine: A Firehouse Rebellion
When the city government stripped Seattle Engine Company No. 2 of their apparatus to give it to a new company, the firefighters organized a defiant public meeting to protest the 'unwarranted usurpation of authority.'
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Pursuant to call, some ten or twelve members of Seattle Engine Company No. 2 met at the engine house last night. Mr. Keerer was called to the chair, and he requested Gardner Keeting to state the object of the meeting. By the published proceedings of the last City Council meeting, it will be seen that the steam fire engine purchased by the city for Company No. 2 has been transferred to Company No. 4, thus leaving us without an engine to work with. The object of this meeting is to decide whether the company will yield to the will of the City Council, or whether it will continue its organization and protest against this unwarranted usurpation of authority. J. Kelly said, 'I think we'd better hang together, and tough it out a little longer.' The company adopted resolutions stating the City Council's action was illegal and calculated to destroy the efficiency of the Seattle Fire Department. They argued that property worth a million dollars was being jeopardized to protect property worth a thousand, noting that the engine was moved to a location that hadn't contributed to its cost. The company resolved: 'We will, so long as we have an engine, run her in the interests of our city, and if we are compelled against our protest to lose it, we will hide our time, nail our colors to the mast until such a time as common and just men replace our present city authorities.'
“We will hide our time, nail our colors to the mast until such a time as common and just men replace our present city authorities, and we are reinstated with our own.”
This 1885 protest over the arbitrary relocation of fire resources mirrors current debates in Seattle regarding the shifting of civic services and the perceived disconnect between City Hall's administrative decisions and the practical needs of specific neighborhoods. Even in 1885, Seattleites were deeply skeptical of 'power behind the throne' directing city affairs away from the interests of the public.
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