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OKI Wanna Know
Perhaps the most hyper-local reporting around, OKI Wanna Know answers listeners' nagging questions about stubbornly unexplained things in the Greater Cincinnati area. Bill Rinehart, local host of WVXU’s broadcast of All Things Considered, dives deep into researching the backstory of each crowdsourced mystery and reports back with his findings twice a month.

OKI Wanna Know: Why are Glendale's fire trucks painted black?

A black fire engine with a gold stripe on a concrete pad on a sunny day.
Bill Rinehart
/
WVXU
Glendale has two engines, and several support vehicles, all of which are painted black.

Our feature OKI Wanna Know looks at questions you may not have even known you wanted an answer to. This week, WVXU's Bill Rinehart digs into one of his own queries.

Recently we talked about how fire companies get their numbers. The Cincinnati Fire Museum connected us with firefighter and paramedic Brian Doering, who knew about that, and a lot of other fire department facts, stories, and trivia. Seeing as how this is Fire Prevention Month, I didn't think anyone would mind if I asked a question that's long mystified me.

Why are Glendale's fire trucks black? Why aren't they a more visible color, like red?

That question led to another...

Why are many fire department vehicles red?

Doering says it's a question that's been asked before, and there are several theories, but no definitive one.

"One of them is, it's the same reason barns are red — it was the easiest paint to make, so it was the cheapest," he says. "When they had these hand-drawn, all-wood — they're basically farm troughs with a hand-pump — [it's] very easy to just say 'I'm going to paint it red' because everybody was giving red paint out. You could go get it and paint your barn red, so why not just paint this red?"

RELATED: Where do the numbers on fire engines come from?

Doering says the next theory is the complete opposite: that red paint was expensive and a sign of quality.

"A couple of fire companies found somebody to give them red paint, and they became these premiere units because you could afford to paint all of your apparatus red."

The next theory traces back to when fire departments were for-profit organizations. Doering says companies would have a gimmick to distinguish themselves from the competition.

"There was a group of firefighters who just said [they] wanted to be as ridiculous and as flamboyant as possible, that way they'll remember that this red apparatus put (the fire) out and it won't be hard to find us. If you go to a town meeting or you go out into the square, you're like 'Oh! There's one of those red vehicles. That's gotta be the guys that put out my fire.' "

The last theory is tied into that; Doering says it's about being visible, but not directly about profit.

"You go back to the original Fords, it was 'Yeah, you can absolutely get one, but it's going to be black,' " he says. "To have a red vehicle on the street would be unheard of, and it would stick out, and add to the visualization of 'Hey, this is out of place. Where is it going? Oh, it's going on an emergency call, so we should probably let it have the right-of-way.' "

An antique red fire engine with C. F. D. painted on the hood.
Bill Rinehart
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WVXU
This 1917 Ahrens-Fox engine is on display at the Cincinnati Fire Museum.

Cincinnati was one of the biggest manufacturers of early fire engines. Ahrens Fox had a factory in Camp Washington. Doering says it made sense because Cincinnati is the home of professional firefighting.

"What better place to manufacture them?" Doering asks. "You don't want to use the word 'test,' but they could really put them through their paces, and be like, 'Well the city of Cincinnati uses our apparatus,' and they're, at the time, a massive fire department, plenty of resources, very well managed. It's new but the concept isn't new, and they have figured this out. So if they're going with our apparatus, that's a bragging right where ever you go."

The Cincinnati Fire Museum has two Ahrens Fox engines, one of which is on display. They're both red.

OK, so why are Glendale's trucks black?

Doering says there's no official standard for the color of rescue vehicles. In fact, there are a number of local departments besides Glendale that have eschewed red, like Sycamore Township, where green is the primary color, and Erlanger, which uses yellow and black.

RELATED: Did a railroad really once run through Spring Grove Cemetery?

Glendale's fire apparatus are black — with a gold and red reflective stripe, but still mostly black. Fire Chief William Jetter says there's a good reason.

"Years ago, Glendale had an Ahrens Fox truck that was their primary fire response," Jetter says. "When the time came for a new fire truck, there was a lady in the town, her name was Carruthers, and she bought the first fire truck, and she liked the color black, so she bought a black fire truck and that's how the whole color scheme started in Glendale."

According to Glendale Heritage Preservation, Elizabeth Carruthers bought the pumper in 1980. Her father had married the sister of William Procter. Elizabeth owned Hetherington Farms and Kennels, home of Elsie the Cow.

Elizabeth Carruthers was married to Thomas H. Carruthers III. He's generally recognized as the man who introduced black squirrels to the community. Those are honored today with a series of fiberglass sculptures, including one black squirrel dressed as a firefighter.

A fiberglass statue of a black squirrel dressed as a firefighter.
Bill Rinehart
/
WVXU
This fiberglass statue is one of 25 that were unveiled in 2005, to commemorate Glendale's sesquicentennial. Only about a dozen remain.

Chief Jetter admits black isn't the most visible of colors.

"When it's black outside as far as night goes, you can't see in front of your face, you have to be careful," he says. "That's why that truck's got illumination all over it so people know there's a fire truck there."

Jetter says Glendale has ordered a new fire engine. It will be red with some black.

Is it a 'fire truck' or 'fire engine'?

You may also be wondering if the terms "fire truck" and "fire engine" are interchangeable. They are not.

Brian Doering explains what a truck company is.

RELATED: What was Battery F 136th Field Artillery, and why do they have a monument?

"There is no water on a truck company. They don't extinguish fire. They rely on the engine company to get there, secure water, which is generally a fire hydrant," he says. "With that water supply, they drag hoses into a building and actually extinguish a fire."

Doering calls engine crews the "workhorse" of the fire department.

"Your job when you pull up at a fire is to get access to that building and get people out and salvage whatever you can," he says.

Bill Rinehart started his radio career as a disc jockey in 1990. In 1994, he made the jump into journalism and has been reporting and delivering news on the radio ever since.