"Men of Colour": Race, Riots, And Black Firefighters' Struggle for Equality from the AFA to the Valiants (Section II RACE AND Nation) (African Fire Association‪)‬

Fire! Few exclamations instinctively instill an intense, visceral reaction that conjures up terrifying images of one's home engulfed in flames, families left homeless, or worse, the loss of life. Benjamin Franklin recognized this potential danger in 1735, when he declared fire "the fiercest enemy of property" in his Pennsylvania Gazette. Subsequent articles calling for the creation of a volunteer fire association resulted in the formation of the Union Fire Company, whose members were some of the most prominent men in Philadelphia, including signers of the Declaration of Independence. Since then, firefighters have been providing an often overlooked but invaluable public service, perpetuated partly by tradition, but mostly of necessity. What began as an early urban reform experiment rapidly evolved into an indispensable local "first responder" agency that has remained a basic institution for more than 250 years. (1) A fire company is a unique organization. A deeply rooted social function, fire fighting provides scholars with view of human interactions through the lens of the community. Influenced by changing technology, local politics, and fluctuating demographic patterns, the fire company serves as a cross-section of American society. Fire companies, like other institutions, were also shaped by social mores predicated on ethnicity, and, throughout most of its history, race, a salient factor in the recruitment, structure and evolution of fire fighting.