Fire Sale to Honor Heroes

The leather bucket made in 1790 was meant to stand ready beside the door in case a fire burst out at home or in the neighborhood. The fine-tooled vessel bore the owner’s name: J.N. Marshall.

With time, this object of utility has matured into a coveted memento of Americana. No one knows what it cost originally, but the fire bucket is expected to bring several thousand dollars at the largest auction ever of U.S. firefighting memorabilia.

The Nov. 10 sale by Skinner, one of this country’s biggest auction houses, was in the works for nearly a year before firefighters vaulted into the headlines as heroes of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center.

“At first, we considered postponing this auction out of a feeling of respect,” an introduction in the auction’s catalog explains. “We at Skinner, like many in the Northeast, have personal connections to some of the victims, as well as close ties with the fire and police services. To some of us, an auction right now didn’t feel right.”

But firefighters themselves prevailed upon the family-owned business to hold the sale as scheduled.

“They told us, ‘This is our heritage. We’re going to celebrate it,’ ” said Catherine Riedel, Skinner’s director of marketing.

From nozzles to helmets to cast-iron toy trucks, the sale of more than 1,000 items coincides with a growing interest in material related to the art and science of firefighting. Private collectors long have traded in this niche market, a crossover between traditional American folk art and the kind of machinery collecting that Riedel said often appeals to men. It also has strong sentimental value, encompassing U.S. history and a proud profession.

Early firefighters served entirely as volunteers, explained Fire Chief Paul Romano of Lynnfield, Mass., who is an avid collector. Fire service membership was hard to come by, Romano said. “You had to be voted in, and firefighters became very strong social figures in the community.”

With their strong esprit de corps, the fire volunteers nurtured their own tradition of heroism--adopting names like Vigilant, Resolute or Never Fear, Romano said.

A ceremonial element also figured high in the profession, producing many of the artifacts that have turned into valuable collectors’ items. Some fire companies used one set of hoses for fires and a separate more elegant set for parades, Romano said.

“It has always been a noble calling,” he said, “and it generated a lot of memorabilia.”

So specialized was the market for many years that, in the past, collectors all seemed to know one another. If one grew bored with an antique steam fire engine, the collector simply called another and made a deal.

But antiques experts say the field has expanded to include at least 10,000 collectors. Many are members of the profession. Others belong to associations such as the Vintage Firefighting Club. Many antiques also end up in this country’s more than 200 firefighting museums.

Along with the rising interest, prices have skyrocketed. Skinner vice president Steve Fletcher said the auction house sold a single fire bucket not long ago for $50,000.

“It was a masterpiece,” he said.

Auctioneer George Glastris estimated that the material to be sold next month could bring “a quarter of a million dollars, easily.”

More than half the items in the sale come from one anonymous collector in Pennsylvania, Glastris said. The collector was moving away from a farm, Glastris said, and no longer had room to store or display all the badges and trumpets and plaques--among many other objects he has put up for sale.

Whether the tragedy of Sept. 11 will raise prices remains to be seen. Firefighters, after all, went up the stairs at New York City’s World Trade Center when everyone else was headed down. If the public needed a reminder of just how valiant firefighters, police officers and others in the rescue business are, the destruction of the twin towers and the damage to the Pentagon provided glaring proof.

But Fletcher noted that this country always has thought highly of its safety and rescue workers. He held up a framed print depicting firefighters as heroes in the course of their daily jobs.

“Currier and Ives did a whole series of these firefighting prints during the 19th century,” he said.

And Glastris, a specialist in items pertaining to science and technology--that is, machines--said he doubted that the events of Sept. 11 would unduly inflate the market.

“People are not going to say, ‘There has been a terrible tragedy; let’s go out and buy fire buckets,’ ” Glastris said.

Still, serious collectors probably will not worry about a connection between prices and what happened at the twin towers.

“A hard-core collector says: ‘Hmm, pay the gas bill? Buy the fire bucket? Gas bill? Fire bucket?’ ” Glastris said. “Then he decides, ‘Oh, buy the fire bucket. The gas bill will wait.’ ”

A yet-to-be determined portion of the auction’s proceeds will be donated to New York’s Uniformed Firefighters Assn. Widows’ and Children’s Fund.