The Lawrenceburg Fire Department was established in 1898, in the aftermath of a massive blaze which completely destroyed more than 1/4 of the Public Square. The Florence ‘Times’ published that the fire was believed to have been started by an errant cigarette.

In the 19th and early 20th centuries, fire was a real concern. Most homes and businesses were heated by wood- or coal-burning stoves, and practically all cooking was done over the open hearth or, later, on wood-burning ranges. Add all of that to the fact that most structures were shoddily-constructed frame buildings of wood, and you can see why fire was such a scourge to early Lawrence County.

Before there was an organized fire department, the city’s only means of combating fire was for every man in town to keep a bucket ready, and the alarm would be shouted from house to house if fire was spotted.

An example of how this system worked can be seen in how Lawrence County court official William T. Nixon handled such an alarm in 1880. On the evening of March 23, he wrote in his journal, “I went down to see Mrs Edmiston and while there an alarm was raised that old Mrs Johnson was over at schoolhouse and burning up all the wood. I went over but Shff Sanders had got there before I came up and had taken her over to town. She was put in jail on charge of vagrancy and she is now there. She threatens to burn the town.”

And again on December 16, 1882, Nixon wrote, “Today I attended in the office until near 10 O’clock when an alarm of fire was raised which was occasioned by the accidental burning of the Kitchen and smoke house at father Parkes’ old homestead.”

Unfortunately, it took a huge disaster like the 1898 fire for the city to realize that its system of citizens carrying buckets was not sufficient to battle the scourge of fire. While the ashes from that 1898 blaze still smoldered on the Square, city leaders met and agreed to purchase ladders, a fire-bell for the top of the courthouse, and eventually a fire engine.

This photo was made in 1923, and shows the Lawrenceburg Fire Department as it had evolved from 1898, in their leather jackets and helmets, with a modern fire engine to help battle blazes.

We at Lawrence County History Trivia salute all of our county’s brave firemen and other civil servants.