Some of you have been asking about this beautiful fire truck, the pride and joy of the Harbor Fire Department in Harbor, Oregon, so I did some checking. Here’s what I learned:

It’s a 1925 Stutz fire engine built by the Stutz Fire Engine Company of Indianapolis, IN (1919-1928). A separate company from Stutz passenger cars, it made fire trucks in pumper, ladder truck and combination form, with 4- and 6-cylinder Wisconsin engines. Their peak period was the mid-1920s when deliveries were made to fire departments all over the country and also to Tokyo, Japan. In 1926 they turned to their own 175hp 6-cylinder ohc engine. Link

Between 1924 and 1926, they apparently built nine gigantic pumpers with 1200-GPM midship-mount piston pumps, and all nine were originally sold for Stutz by the Howard Copper Corporation of Portland, OR, to small towns in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho. Most of those towns were lumber communities where logging fires require huge volumes of water.

Incredibly, seven of the nine giant Stutz pumpers survive today and all seven lined-up at the centennial celebration of the Boise Fire Department on May 25, 2002. Fourth from the left in the photo is Harbor’s pumper, listed at the time as a “1926, now owned by the fire department of Harbor, OR, in ‘original’ condition (although repainted while in service, it is considered ‘original’ because it has not undergone restoration since its retirement from active firefighting duty).”

My daughter-in-law, Lori, says that around six years ago, when her dad first became involved with the Harbor Fire Department, he learned that the fire truck hadn’t been running for several years and took it on as a project. With the help of his father (Lori’s grandfather) they got it running and back on the road. Lori believes it’s a 1925 rather than a 1926. I’ll ask her to check with John to confirm one way or the other. I’ll be interested in which engine it has; a Stutz would seem to indicate 1926 while a four or six cylander Wisconsin would seemingly indicate 1925. And this one has a right hand drive, a curiosity to me. I know Stutz made some trucks for Japan, so I wonder…

This Stutz is also featured on the cover of the fiction book, Lady Busker and Bim, Tales From Sodhenge.