Historical Marker
Sulphur Springs Volunteer Fire Department and Fire Bell of 1889
Sulphur Springs, Hopkins County · Texas
Erected 1975
The Handbook of Texas records a fire the plaque skips. The courthouse built on the east side of the square in 1882 burned in 1894, and a granite and limestone Romanesque Revival courthouse designed by James Riely Gordon replaced it. The Hopkins County Museum keeps a restored 1929 Southern ladder truck that served the city's fire department, in a firehouse built in Heritage Park in 2006, along with artifacts donated by area firemen. The plaque's brass bell, bought in 1889, was in time replaced by a siren.
What the plaque says
Sulphur Springs Volunteer Fire Department and Fire Bell of 1889 Volunteer fire fighters, organized soon after Sulphur Springs was incorporated (1870), used a "bucket brigade" and hand-drawn equipment to control blazes before the city purchased a steam fire engine in 1888. To summon firemen, this 500-pound brass bell was bought in 1889 and hung in the tower of the engine house. It was replaced in the 1930s by a siren which spread the alarm over a wider area of the growing town. Professional firemen joined the force in the 1940s, but volunteers still help battle major fires. (1975)
Where it stands
33.14377, -95.60067 · Directions
Worth the stop nearby
- Cooper Lake State Park — 15 miTwo units on Jim Chapman Lake, a Corps reservoir proposed in the late 1930s, stalled by a lawsuit until 1984 and dedicated in 1991, with a 10.5-mile equestrian trail and wildlife land around it.