U - Newton Free Library

ORGANIZATION. 49
tract with Hunneman & Co. for a second-class
machine; and November 30th purchased the site
of the present No. 1 engine station, and January
11, 1868, provided for the construction of a building
thereon,
money for that purpose having
been appropriated at the previous November
town meetin
January 11, 1868, the engine was ready for
delivery, and on that day it was given a test
before the selectmen and engineers at Hunneman's
factory in Roxbury, and was accepted by
the committee ; but as there was no place provided
to house it, and would not be until the
new station was con^leted, it was not delivered
until nine months later, October 19th, when the
new house was ready to receive it.
In the mean
time it had been doing relief duty in other places.
The engine had double, four-and-three-eighthsinch
pumps, eight-inch stroke, with a capacity
of five hundred gallons per minute.
It was a
straight-frame engine, and weighed five thousand
eight hundred pounds.
It was painted
carmine, and December 7th was named by the
selectmen Newton No. 1. The engine was given
a public exhibition test a few days later, and
Thursday, November 5th, the new station was
dedicated under the auspices of the committee.
The first fire at which the new engine did duty
was the burning of W. W. Wright's house at
Auburndale, November 11th, at eleven o'clock,