Fighting Fires with Hand Pumpers

The first fire engine was a hand pumper that accommodated five or six men on each side, pumping with long handles. It was "quite a nice little squirt gun." Later, a larger hand pumper took fifteen to sixteen men per side, and could send out two sprays, or if only one, a spray as high as the Methodist [United] Church spire. Water was supplied from wooden cisterns placed along the street in line with the ditches and filled from surface water.

Richmond Hill Women's Institute,"Tweedsmuir History"(Richmond Hill:1957),unpaginated