In 1927, wealthy businessman Joseph R. Grundy donated five new Ahrens-Fox fire engines to his hometown of Bristol, PA. View photo of all five lined-up in front of Bristol fire station. Two of these have been restored, and two more survive as parts rigs.
Five Ahrens-Fox Model N-S-4 1000-GPM piston pumpers, painted in a rainbow of colors, lined-up at the Allegheny County firemen's convention in Tarentum, PA. Date of these photos is in dispute: they had long been thought to be from 1928, when a big firemen's convention is known to have been held in Tarentum, but more recent research places the date of these photos as June, 1930. Allegheny County is the area including and surrounding the city of Pittsburgh, PA, well known for its steel factories, and as the home of Heinz pickles and ketchup.
Allegheny County, PA, also had at least one other odd-color Ahrens-Fox piston pumper at the time of this photo, but it was not a 1000-GPM Model N-S-4 like these five: a black 1928 Model M-S-4 (800 GPM) #1758 of Brownsville, PA.
By comparison, the county's other Ahrens-Fox piston pumper, Wilmerding, PA's 1926 Model N-S-4 #1664, must have seemed boring, in tradtional Ahrens-Fox 101 dark red (#1664 still sports its factory paint job today, owned by Ray Graham of Arlington, WA).
The city of Pittsburgh itself also owned a red Ahrens-Fox piston pumper, 1923 Model N-S-4 #1602, which is believed to have been scrapped in the early 1960s.
Perhaps inspired by these photos, Tarentum bought a red Ahrens-Fox in 1931, Model U-N-T-4 #3404, which they still own. Like the rainbow five in the photo, it is a 1000-GPM piston pumper, equipped with 1200 feet of 2-1/2 inch hose and a 60-gallon booster (water) tank, but as a quad (quadruple combination), Tarnetum's Fox also carries over 300 feet of wood ground ladders.
In 1927 and 1928, New Orleans, LA, received ten new Ahrens-Foxes. All ten were lined-up for a group photo in 1928.
Throughout the 1960s and early 1970s, Chuck Delorm owned a nationwide chain of nightclubs (from New Jersey to Nevada), with a restored antique fire engine displayed at each club. His famed "Your Father's Moustache" jazz bands played at each club. Delorm had fire engines of many makes, but the Ahrens-Fox piston pumper was his favorite. He asked antique car restorer Louis Izydore of Duquesne, PA, to scour the country for Foxes, buy them for him, restore them, and maintain them. Izydore did a great job, helping Delorm to acquire a total of eight Fox piston pumpers, ranging in age from 1921 to 1927. Here, four of the eight line up in front of Izydore's shop in 1968.
In October, 1970, the Fairchester Hose Haulers, the southern New York chapter of SPAAMFAA, held its first-ever antique fire engine muster at Kensico Dam Plaza, Valhalla, NY. About 25 fire engines showed-up for that first event, including four Ahrens-Foxes. By the second annual event, on June 26, 1971, word had spread about this terrific muster site, and a new tradition was born: "Cannonball Alley", a lineup of 8 to 12 Ahrens-Fox piston pumpers operating at draft from the reflecting pond at the base of the dam (so named because all those spherical air chambers resemble a lineup of cannon balls). Eight Ahrens-Foxes formed the first Valhalla "Cannonball Alley" on June 26, 1971. About 50 fire engines showed participated in this 1971 Valhalla muster.
The 1972 Valhalla muster grew to about 100 antique fire engines, from all over Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. This panaromic photo show a reprsesentative sampling of the participating rigs, with a scattering of Foxes among them. And once more, eight Ahrens-Foxes formed a "Cannonball Alley".
"Cannonball Alley" at the June 23, 1973 Valhalla muster consisted of 9 Ahrens-Fox piston pumpers.
Four Ahrens-Fox piston pumpers await their turn to pump in the famed "Cannonball Alley" at the 1974 Valhalla muster. About 150 fire engines participated at Valhalla that year, about 25 of which were Ahrens-Foxes of various types (piston, rotary, and centrifugal pumpers, ladder trucks, etc.)
This is the Valhalla muster in 1975, with 9 Ahrens-Fox piston pumpers formed into yet another "Cannonball Alley".
Somehow, a lone Ward-LaFrance pumper insinutaed itself into the 8 Ahrens-Foxes of "Cannonball Alley" at the June 24, 1979, Valhalla muster.
One rotary-gear Fox, one centrifugal Fox, and five of the eight participants in "Cannonball Alley" formed some of the most thrilling action at the June 24, 1979, Valhalla muster.
A record ten Ahrens-Fox piston pumpers formed the "Cannonball Alley" at the June 28, 1980, Valhalla muster, for the tenth annual antique fire engine event at Kensico Dam.
Appropriately, ten Ahrens-Fox piston pumpers formed the tenth "Cannonball Alley" at the June, 1981 Valhalla muster.
Many of the same Ahrens-Foxes that appeared at Valhalla, NY, each year, also attended a slightly smaller annual muster, a little further northeast, at Milford, CT.
Another antique fire engine muster that attracted large numbers of Ahrens-Foxes each year was held at Greenfield Village and Henry Ford Museum, in Dearborn, MI. Here, five Foxes lined up at Greenfield Village in 1978.
Ahrens-Fox fire engines were made in Cincinnati, so it is no surprise that there are still many of them in the Cincinnati metropolitan area. For example, here are three Cincinnati-area Foxes lined-up at Hamilton, Ohio in 1975. That same year found six Ahrens-Foxes lined-up at an antgique fire engine muster at Oeder's Lake in Morrow, OH.
Ahrens-Fox fire engines were never as popular on the West Coast as they were on the east coast and in the midwest. So it was an especially rare occasion to be ab le to line-up three Ahrens-Foxes at Long Beach, CA, in 1987.
In 1974, the late John Orner, asssietd by Ed Hass and others organized an elite parade corps called The Flying Foxes, to lead-off major parades with bunches of Ahrens-Foxes. The first Flying Foxes event had 28 Ahrens-Foxes leading the Pennsylvania State Firemen's Parade at Conshohockken, PA (four abreast in seven rows), on September 28, 1974.
The second Flying Foxes was held at Morristown, NJ, October 4, 1975. Here, five of the 15 participating Foxes line-up in front of the Morristown fire station.
The third Flying Foxes was held at Vineland, NJ, in 1976. Here, four of the eight participating Foxes line up.
Here, 11 of the 13 participating Foxes lined-up for a photo at the 1978 Flying Foxes event in Hempstead, NY. These 13 Foxes ran down the parade route 3 across.
The Flying Foxes returned to Hempstead, NY, for a repeat engagement in 1980.
Inspired by the success of the Flying Foxes, Ed Hass organized the first Ahrens-Fox Weekend at Newark, NJ, in 1976. 8 Foxes signed-up, 6 attended, and four posed together. A repeat Ahrens-Fox Weekend in 1977 brought-out only three Foxes, so the Ahrens-Fox Weekend never became an annual event after that.
Ed Hass next organized an Ahrens-Fox corps to lead a parade at Bristol, RI, in 1981. Five Ahrens-Foxes participated.
Another view of the five Ahrens-Foxes that led the parade at Bristol, RI, in 1981.
The neighboring Long Island towns of Baldwin, Freeport, Rockville Centre, and Oceanside have a long history with Ahrens-Fox fire apparatus.
Baldwin was the first of the four towns to buy an Ahrens-Fox, with the 1927 delivery of Model N-S-4 #1675, now owned by the fire department of Hamilton OH. In 1929, Freeport bought N-S-4 #3376, and Baldwin bought N-S-4 #3380 to replace #1675. Rockville Centre was next, with a 1937 BT #4018, which they still own. Freeport replaced #3376 with Model HT #3481 in 1949. Baldwin got #3486 in 1951 (still own), and Oceanside got #3487 in 1952.
When Freeport received #3481 in 1949, they posed #3481 and #3376 together in front of the Hose Company 4 firehouse.
When Baldwin received #3486 in 1951, they posed #3486 and #3380 together in front of the Hose Company 1 firehouse.
In 1965, Baldwin wrecked #3486 and returned it to Ahrens-Fox for rebuilding b y the legendary Curt Nepper. When it returned to Baldwin in 1968, #3486 lined-up with #3481 of Freeport, #3487 of Oceanside, and #4018 of Rockville Centre for what was billed as Fox Day 1968.
In 2001, Hose Company #1 in Baldwin, NY, hosted a party to celebrate that their 1951 Ahrens-Fox was still in very active service after half a century. Four Ahrens-Foxes and an American-LaFrance attended the fire engine's birthday party.
3 of the 4 participating Foxes that celebrated the 50th birthday of Ahrens-Fox HT #3486, still in front-line service at Baldwin, NY, in 2001.