Saturday Search: A Jericho Ford Fire Truck (Updated: 2/15/2015)
Betsey Murphy, local history librarian for the Jericho Library, is researching this fire truck.
Betsey Murphy: "We are looking for information about this Jericho Fire Truck. A friend of one of our employees has bought the truck and is restoring it. I believe he found it in the New Cassell Factory Junk Yard. It is a Ford from the Eastern Fire Apparatus Company in Brooklyn."
Enjoy,
Howard Kroplick
Photos of Vito Marchese and the fire truck taken from 1949-1950. Provided by his daughter to Willie Titteron
Photos of the Jericho Fire Department
Maltby's Garage
Before becoming the Jericho Fire House, the building was D.F. Maltby's Automobile Garage. In October 1908, it was the headquarters for the Locomobile Company and the winner Old 16.
Howard Kroplick's Findings (Updated: 2/15/2015)
The fire truck looks like it was originally a1948 Ford F-1 pickup.
Another fire truck modification made by Eastern Fire Apparatus.
Comments
These old flathead FORD fire trucks are interesting. They could be ordered with Police Interceptor engines that had 254 cid [used Mercury crank-shafts] or with the Lincoln EL-8 engine. Some may have been re-fitted with Y-block engines if they were kept in service into the late 1950s.
The 1949 truck sales brochure offered either a 6 cylinder 226 inch overhead valve rated at 95 horsepower, or an L-head (flathead) 239 inch engine rated at 100 horsepower. Later years, circa 1952 offered the Y-block engine.
That particular model with the horizontal bars for the grille was sold as either a 1948, 1949, or 1950 model. Minor improvements were made from one year to another, but the VIN designated the model year. Production ceased in May 1950.
The Jericho truck was a model 85 delivered as a “windshield and chassis”. It was manufactured in February 1949 at the Ford Edgewater (NJ) assembly plant. Jericho FD got it and sent it out to Eastern Fire Apparatus to have the body installed. It was purchased locally from Hempstead Welding, a Ford truck dealership at the time. Jericho FD sold it in October 1965 for $125.
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From Howard Kroplick
Thanks, Willie T.
It is very creative and informative thanks for sharing this idea keep in touch in future updates