Rushden Research Group: Fire Service 1950s

The Rushden Echo and Argus, 11th February 1955, transcribed by Jim Hollis

Our firemen keep busy between calls

With Chief Officer A P Timpson looking on critically, firemen reel out their hoses in practice for the time when lives and property may depend on their speed and efficiency.

Roofs and windows get a wash down, but there is a more serious purpose behind this scene as two firemen get in some hose practice at the back of Newton Road fire station

Not all tea and skittles
What do firemen do between fires? A visit to any local station soon dispels the popular idea that they spend their time drinking tea, playing cards and skittles and smoking (being careful not to start any fires).

True, recreation facilities are provided – but a lot of hard routine work and training also has to be fitted in

Talk In Progress
When I called at Rushden Fire Station (writes John Woodward), I found the large upstairs room, equipped with billiards and table tennis tables, skittles and darts boards, being used for one of the lectures which are part of the regular activities of men on duty.

Breathing apparatus is given a routine check.

This might have damped the enthusiasm of any small boy with a passion for fire engines, but a walk into the yard at the back, where a seven-stone dummy was being brought down a ladder by a helmeted fireman, would have restored his keenness.

"Look, Mum, no hands"
Jock at the top, has farther to fall, and keeps a wary hand on the ladder, but his colleague shows how easy it is to have both hands free to work on a hook-ladder.

Hook Ladders
During the next hour or so, I watched firemen hanging on hook ladders (with a “Look, mum, no hands” technique), was initiated into the need for different belts and equipment for different occasions; saw the fire station roof get a wash-down by two firemen practising hose-drill from a ladder, and breathing apparatus tested; visited the washroom, where someone is always on duty – and found that Rushden’s firemen are by way of being carpenters on the side.

Every station in the county fire brigade has a specific task, and at Rushden that task is the repair and maintenance of all the fire brigade ladders in the county. In what, during the war, was a watch-room manned by a full-time staff of seven girls, there are always ladders awaiting scraping, painting, varnishing or repair.

Ten Full-Time
At Rushden, strength is ten full-time firemen and 11 “retained” men. There are a number of the full-time men on duty during the day, and there is always someone on duty during the night. All 21 are on call at their homes.

A fireman’s life is not all running up ladders squirting water. Each fire station in the county
has a specific task, and at Rushden they
maintain and repair ladders.

They have two fire engines, one equipped with wireless to keep in contact with headquarters. If both machines are out, one from another station is called in to stand by.

Thick and Fast
Calls vary – there may be one or a dozen in a week – but they can come thick and fast, like the day when both fire engines were out all day and late into the night and another engine from Wellingborough was also called out.

I left fully convinced that the firemen have enough to keep them busy between fires.

The Rushden Echo and Argus, 19 July 1957, transcribed by Jim Hollis

Rushden Firemen Cause Emergency
After working their normal day-time duty, Rushden firemen have in the past agreed to be on call in case of fires at night and have put in an average of 130 hours a week. Now that they have declined to accept any future part-time duties – a “serious emergency” has arisen.

The danger to fire-fighting efficiency at Rushden was pointed out to Northamptonshire County Council yesterday, when the Fire Brigade Committee asked that the Rushden full time staff should be increased from 10 to 15, that a new 24-hour shift should be introduced, and that the part-time establishment should be cut from 20 to 12. The estimated extra cost of this arrangement was said to be £2,500 a year.

The committee said that Rushden, with so much factory property, was classified as a town demanding first attendance within five minutes. Some of the part-time men lived so far from the station that it would not be possible at night to attend in less than six minutes, but the full time staff had agreed for an average of 15s a week, to have fire bells in their homes and to be on call during their normal off duty hours.

Withdrawal
In April the whole time firemen gave three weeks’ notice of withdrawal from this voluntary service, and it was found that for some time the men had been increasingly dissatisfied with the arrangements. They complained at the restriction upon their liberty in off duty hours, and of the inconvenience and disturbance of family life caused by the fire bells in their homes.

Later, they agreed to extend their notice up to July 21.

The council was told that the situation of the Rushden firemen compared very unfavourably with that of whole time men at Wellingborough and Kettering, who, working on a two-shift system, completed 60 duty hours a week.

At a meeting with Fire Brigade Union representatives “it was immediately apparent that the men were firm in their refusal to continue to operate permanently the callout system at night, or, indeed, to operate any system which would involve them in being called out from their homes.”

Best Settlement
After prolonged negotiations, union officials offered to recommend the men to accept a system of 24 hours on duty followed by 24 hours off, which, because it involved overtime, could be adopted only with their agreement.

Although it was naturally reluctant to make any concession entailing additional expense, the committee was fully satisfied that the settlement reached was the best it could obtain in the circumstances and having regard to the Council’s duty to provide adequate fire cover for Rushden.

About the full-time men and their voluntary service, the committee told the Council: “Only their wholehearted regard for the efficiency of the service prompted them to give it in the first instance and to abide by it for so long.”

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