Hook & ladder wagon

As Americans constructed homes and buildings in the 1800s with more stories, fire companies needed apparatus to douse the flames on the highest floors. Vehicles pushed and pulled by the fire fighters themselves first delivered ladders and extensions to the scene. Later in the century, horse-drawn wagons raced the manually extended ladders to tall buildings. By 1905 Knox Automobile in Springfield, MA, manufactured the first modern ladder trucks to speed equipment to the fires. Technological improvements like a longer turntable ladder (with mechanical extensions) mounted directly on the fire truck shortened fire fighters' response and set-up time. All these improvements in fire-fighting equipment appeared in toy versions for children fascinated with the work of firemen.