Posted 13 years ago
KathleenMayo
(1 item)
My great grandfather and his father my great great grandfather were on the Fire Dept. in Worcester, Mass. My GG Grandfather was Captain. He kept scrapbooks of all clippings from all the fires in Worcester 1896-1905ish.
Plus various other fire dept. books and reports. I've held on to these my whole life.. feeling guilty they are just sitting in a box. Wondering how much this collection is worth?? There are 3-4 albums of newspaper clippings and journal entries of the fires....
It's unfortunate you never received any timely responses to this collection, Kath ~ it looks like quite a trove, although the pictures make it hard to see exactly what all it contains. As to the 'worth', it is quite likely one of a kind and would be appreciated by any fire memorabilia collector such as myself and would probably garner a lot of interest if offered on ebay.
But no one could appreciate it more than someone currently connected with that town's fire department! Even smaller city departments usually have a historian charged with preserving such items and I would encourage you to try to find & connect with them. Dont know where you are located now (or if you are even still connected to this website), but if this were in my hands, I would have to seriously consider honoring my ancestors' connection to that brotherhood and offer it to them first.
I am not connected with that department (live on the other side of the continent in fact), but could see a collection being taken up by my department's members to obtain it if similar came up. Give it a shot (and if you don't know how to go about it, send me an email and maybe I can help).
Interesting what you find on the web....
"*It was during this time period that Worcester became famous. The first brass sliding pole used in the country was in the city of Worcester in 1880. The wooden pole was invented by Chicago fireman David Kenyon in 1878, however the first brass pole appeared in Worcester."
... or you could give 'em to me..... (smile)