Engine Company 212

By Jennifer Scott

In October 2006, the city announced it would sell five firehouses that were closed in 2003. That announcement set off a wave of protests, but at one of those places, Engine 212 in Brooklyn (est. 1869), neighbors had been struggling for years to keep the firehouse open.

In November 1975, the city announced it would close Engine Company 212 in the Northside neighborhood of Williamsburg. Local residents and business could have received the news as just one more painful blow in a season of losses brought on by the fiscal crisis. Instead, Northside residents got together and occupied the firehouse. Led by Adam Veneski, a neighborhood grocer, hundreds of local people took over Engine 212 and refused to leave or let the fire truck or water pumper be taken away. For close to a year and a half, supporters lived in the firehouse, staged countless protests, and monitored damage and deaths in the area from fire. In 1977, a compromise was reached to reopen Engine 212 as a utility unit (“Utility Unit #1”), not as a full-fledged fire service company. A five-member fire rescue company from Queens was transferred to Engine 212. The activists continued to organize, moving themselves across the street to 125 Wythe, a small storefront and former bar, to monitor what they believed was the engine company’s (lack of) activity. Deciding that the firemen were going out on too few calls, they continued their protests to try to bring about a more effective firehouse. They joked that the utility unit was “O’Hagan’s vacation camp,” named after the then fire commissioner opposing them.

Finally, on June 17, 1978, Mayor Koch announced the return of Engine 212 to the firehouse, including many members from the original company. The People’s Firehouse activists received funds under the Comprehensive Employment Training Act (CETA) to begin a pilot fire prevention program. Since then, the People’s Firehouse (PFI), at 113 Berry Street, nearby to Engine 212, has established itself as a place to organize against threats to local safety, health, and living conditions. Besides continuing their mission of insuring fire service to the surrounding communities and engaging in fire prevention activities, they have expanded their services to incorporate a variety of social, health, educational, vocational, and housing concerns.

In October 2002, Naomi Schegloff and I spoke to some members of the People’s Firehouse. We talked about the day of the takeover and about why the firehouse matters to them.

Kurt Hill

“The fiscal crisis came down quite hard, like a ton of bricks on the people of New York under Mayor Abe Beame. The federal government refused to help the city. Remember that famous Daily News headline, ‘Ford to City: Drop Dead.’ That basically was the attitude of the federal government in terms of helping out the largest city in the country during that period. Many services in Brooklyn were eliminated. All kinds of services — police precincts, clinics, extra-curricular programs in schools. And, of course, firehouses, and Engine company 212 — two twelve — was one that was scheduled to be eliminated. Now, in North Brooklyn, we have a lot of wood frame buildings. And when they go up, they go up like tinder boxes. And response time is very, very important. The fire apparatus needs to get there to put the fire out, otherwise lives can be lost. And that’s what was happening. The city basically closed down fire service.

It was definitely becoming a safety issue. I mean, if you close a clinic, a baby clinic, for example, that’s bad because we should be expanding health care for folks who can least afford it. If you cut programs at schools, music programs, marching band, what have you, that’s bad because people should have musical experiences and learn to play an instrument and appreciate the arts. But when you start closing something like fire stations you’re talking about people’s lives, not…not simply…not being able to play the flute, or march in a band, or whatnot, you’re talking about people’s lives. And that’s what galvanized community resistance.”

M.P.

“I used to be an auxiliary fireman. During this period the city kept taking fire companies from their neighborhoods and doing away with them. We knew something was going to happen at Engine 212 ’cause the firemen that were there started taking their personal stuff home. They were going to close it at 9 o’clock in the morning Thanksgiving Day. Thanksgiving eve, Adam, me, and the community got together, walked into the firehouse at 6 o’clock and took it over.

We got inside the firehouse and they have what they call an air-raid siren on the roof. Someone pushed that and more people came down. We had something like 500 people by this time. We told the firemen that were working that night that they had the option to leave or stay. We’re not going to be holding you against your will. We’re not gonna be charged with kidnapping!

The cops came. They outnumbered with people. They had riot gear on, helmets, plexiglass, shields. The cops ask the fire department chief, ‘What do you want us to do?’ The chief told the cops, ‘Leave them stay for now. It’s their property. It’s the People’s Firehouse. It’s the People’s House.’ That’s how they got the name People’s Firehouse. It belongs to the people.

We spent Thanksgiving Day in that house. (laughs) My wife didn’t like it, but… We were ready, if anything did happen, if they tried to attack us and remove us by force, we planned to go to that air-raid siren ourselves and push that button so even more people would come.

Ethan Allen sent their employees over, a furniture place. Rosenwach Water Tanks, used to be right across the street from them, they sent their workers over whenever they figured we were going to have a problem. They helped us out.

We kept about 100 people or more living at the firehouse for 18 months. 24 hours a day. We were sleeping on top of the hose, we were sleeping upstairs on the floors… My son was there with me. He had more grandmothers than anybody. The firehouse had showers, so we used those, in shifts. Some people went home if they lived close by and came back right away. We were getting food donations from everybody. Bread companies…Pepsi donated sodas…We had plenty of food. We even had a company from the Bronx that delivered us coal, that thing had an old coal furnace for heat, so they delivered us a whole truckload of coal.

In the meantime we were also holding demonstrations all over the city. We held a protest in front of Fire Commissioner O’Hagen’s house. We dumped ashes from a fire in the community in front of his house in Bay Ridge, on his front lawn. Once a month we had a protest, at City Hall, Borough Hall, and we were going back and forth in the courts with them. Once we closed down part of the BQE, just to keep the news media focused on us and keep 212 in the eye of the public. The traffic was backed up 18 miles. I remember that day. Some of the old people were scared to walk up there on the bridge — they were afraid of the heights. There were about 400 of us.”

J.K.

“Adam Veneski told me about the day on the BQE. He used to love to tell this story. The cops arrive and get of their cars, and one guy says to his chief, ‘I can’t do this.’ So the chief says, ‘Why?’ He says, ‘That’s my wife’s mother! I can’t go home if I arrest my wife’s mother. No way!’ So the chief says, ‘Okay, that’s all right. We don’t want any domestic violence.’ The cops really had a hard time, with all these old people in the march. We also had a lot of people with babies and things like that. But the old people were great, because they used to say, ‘What the heck can they do to us? We’re on the way out anyway. So put us in jail, put us in jail, at least we’ll get three meals a day.’

And while we were still in the firehouse, the young people would go to work and leave the kids with the grandparents. For the kids, it was great. It’s a firehouse! You know? Boy! We can play with this and that. It was really nice in that way.”

* * * *

J.K.

“See, in this neighborhood there was always a relationship between the neighborhood and the firehouse. It started so long ago. And I think the idea that they would take it away from us — When I think back on it, it was more than that. It was more like they were taking — friends away. They were taking something that belonged to us away. See, I don’t think that we ever thought that that firehouse belonged to the city. Yeah, we never did. I think actually that’s what it was. The firehouse we thought that was ours. How dare you take away something that belongs to us?”

M.P.

“I went to the firehouse for all kinds of things. My mom was Italian, she spoke Italian, she couldn’t read too much English. So I would go to the firehouse and they used to help me with my homework. Not just me. A bunch of kids. They had a back room, they had like ten kids in the back there. Used to help us out with the homework. That was in the ’60s. Instead of going home with your report card, we had to go to them first and THEN go home. They were like a big brother, father to us.”