APPARATUS FOR EXTINGUISHING FIRES. 499 



la some instances the combination of gas and water aided greatly 

 to extinguish the fire, while in others the gas escaped into the air 

 and served only to force the water in a stream. The successful 

 inventors soon tried large tanks on two and four wheeled trucks, 

 and to-day all sizes, from tin and glass hand grenades up to large 

 double-tank four-wheeled engines, are in use. 



The first chemical engine was put on the market by the New 

 England Fire Extinguisher Company of Northampton, Mass. 

 The Babcock Company of Chicago took this up, and by the 

 aid of one of their engineers, Mr. Wellington Lee, who had 

 previously done much work with steam fire engines, soon made it 

 much more successful. 



The Holloway, of Baltimore, the Babcock and Champion, made 

 by the Fire Extinguisher Manufacturing Company of Chicago, 

 and the Hutson and the Lindgren-Mahan, also of Chicago, are the 

 engines in general use at the present day. The chemicals used in 

 these different engines are more or less the same, and the engines 

 themselves consist of one or two tanks placed either horizontally 

 or vertically, and having one or two lines of small hose attached. 

 In some cases small extension ladders are carried. Combination 

 chemical engines and hose wagons or carriages were used in 

 Canada as early as 1883. Springfield, Ohio, Lawrence, Mass., 

 Chicago, and Milwaukee had them in 188G. They have re- 

 cently been adopted in Boston. The wagon is made deep and 

 narrow, and a chemical tank placed on each side. Combination 

 ladder trucks and chemical engines are also made. The New 

 York department, the largest in the world, has discarded the use 

 of chemical engines, but they are considered necessary adjuncts 

 to most of the other fire departments of the country. Five or 

 ten gallon tank extinguishers, however, are carried on all hose 

 wagons and ladder trucks in New York and elsewhere. The 

 chemical engine can go into action more quickly than a steam 

 fire engine, and will extinguish small blazes with very little water 

 damage. In connection with chemical engines it might be stated 

 that for fires in electrical stations sand is the best extinguisher 

 known. It has been found by experience that the application of 

 water simply complicates matters by crossing currents, increas- 

 ing the sparking, and ruining the plant. 



It has been remarked that the Button hand engines are still 

 made. Country departments, when old city tubs can not be 

 bought, must have new hand engines made for them. The 

 Gleason & Bailey Manufacturing Company, of New York, are 

 extensive builders of these. 



Several inventors have tried their hands at producing an 

 electric fire engine, either to have the boiler and fire box of a 

 steamer replaced with storage batteries, or else to have a trolley 



