Firemen's Association of The State of New York - FASNY Museum of Firefighting

FASNY Museum of Firefighting

The FASNY Museum of Firefighting is home to years of firefighting history in New York State. At the 51st State Firemen's Convention held in Hudson in 1923, a resolution signed by the Presidents and Secretaries of both the Volunteer Firemen's Association and the Exempt Firemen's Association of the City of New York said that if the State Association of the Firemen's Home would authorize the erection of a suitable building for a museum, four fire engines, one built in England in 1725, a Gooseneck more than one hundred years old, a piano-style engine 63 years old and a double-deck engine, would all be donated as the first pieces.

So, amid much anticipation, the Museum was built with a center hall 49 feet (15 m) long with two adjoining wings 24 feet (7.3 m) long, amounting to 2,600 square feet (240 m2) of museum space. At 3 am on the morning of November 12, 1925, six large trucks brought the valuable collection up from New York City. The items were numbered and cataloged and then placed on display. The Museum was dedicated on Memorial Day 1926 with appropriate ceremonies.

In order to accommodate the numerous donations to the Museum, additions were necessary. The first addition was added in 1957, 31 years after the initial opening. The second addition came in 1972, with another expansion in 1989, and yet another in 2000 adding to the current size, totaling more than 50,000 square feet (4,600 m2).