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09/09/2020 09:30 AMDouglas “Doug” Senn, a long serving member of the Essex Fire Department, was at home when he received a call from headquarters this summer.
There was no emergency, but the firefighters on Saybrook Road had made a discovery.
“It was raining [and] somebody went into the storage room and saw that we had a leak,” said Senn.
The leak didn’t surprise the firefighters, but after they moved a storage cabinet, something they uncovered did.
“When they moved the cabinet, there was a four-foot-long, two-foot wide box behind it,” said Senn. “They opened the box and saw the old leather belts.”
The department’s historian since 2012, Senn was asked to come down to the station.
The rediscovery of the fire belts, which were once on display in the former Fire House on Prospect Street “was very exciting,” said Senn.
The Fire Department moved to its current location from Prospect Street in 1999.
“These belts were in a showcase probably from the ‘50s to the ‘80s in the old fire house,” said Senn. “They got boxed up at some point…to get ready to move to the new headquarters and they were forgotten about.”
Due to the inscription of Washington in the leather, Senn knew that the age of the belts had to date “somewhere between 1846 and 1859, closer to 1846 because that is when we had a name change,” he said.
A logbook for a meeting held in 1846 indicates that the department was named the Washington Fire Company, as a tribute to the first president of the United States, George Washington.
By 1859, the department reverted to its current name, Essex Fire Engine Company Number 1.
In addition to the inscription of Washington, the size of the belts provided clues as to their purpose.
Senn says, “they still have the brass buckles and holders for certain tools, but they are not as wide or thick as regular belts…they were specifically made for parades.”
The belts were just one part of a volunteer firefighter’s festive appearance for parades, state conventions, funerals, celebrations, and anniversaries during this time period.
They would also help signify rank in the command structure and have since been replaced with horn clusters worn on a firefighter’s collar.
Understanding the value of the belts as historical objects, Senn contacted Melissa Josefiak, director of the Essex Historical Society.
“He explained there was damage and asked, ‘How do you treat them, get them dry?’” she said.
Based on prior experience with a leak in the archives room of a previous museum and some Internet research, Josefiak gave Senn some ideas on how to wick the moisture from the leather belts to prevent mold growth.
And since “leather is an organic material…whatever kind of water damage they had received, it resulted in two of them being stuck together,” said Josefiak. “He had to gently and carefully pry them apart.”
After addressing the immediate conservation needs of the belts, the Fire Department sent them to the Northeast Document Conservation Center in Massachusetts, where further conservation techniques are being applied.
The Fire Department has used this organization in the past for the preservation of other items, such as meeting minute books that date back to the company’s founding in 1833.
The discovery of the books several years ago, said Senn, was “absolutely amazing. I talked to somebody at the Smithsonian about it and they really don’t know of any places that have full sets of original minutes dating back [that far].”
The Essex Fire Department is the second oldest operating volunteer fire department in the state, after the Wethersfield Fire Department, according to Senn.
“Knowing that the Essex Volunteer Fire Department is very old, that they have materials in their collection that they seek to preserve is a credit,” said Josefiak. “It’s wonderful that there is an organization so conscious of their past that they want to take these steps to preserve [these items].”
Upon their return to Essex, the belts will join other historical objects on display at Fire Headquarters in Essex.a