The Plymouth weekly Democrat. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1860-1869, 1868-01-23
Fire Eseparf.ncnt-OG vgfsoral it is
Composed. and the Privilege
and DUTY OF Every CEsEZeI.o


Composed. and the Privilege
and DUTY OF Every Citizen"
Mr.. EpITOR - Ia your last week. is
sue there appeared a communication from
F." Citizen" in which the Plymouth fire
department was severely censured for IN
efficiency" |. was good thing that your
correspondent signed himself " Citizen"
for if he had not, the reader would have
supposed that he was an outsider, and had
no interest whatever in the preservation of
property in our town, from the tone Of his
communication, but inasmuch as ne is a
i" citizen and is, whether he knows il or
not, interested in the prosperity of our
place, 1 viii give him few items of in
formation which hope he will act upon,
and give the fire department the benefit of
his superior knowledge concerning The
. machine" aud thereby render the de-
partment more " Efficient
The fire companies of Plymouth are
made up of the able-bodied citizens Of the
place, and if he is of that class it is his
privilege and duty to make application fer
membership, and it is the more his duty
from the fact that he Is, undoubtedly, a
gentleman possessed Of vast amount OF
information, which would be Of great SER
vice to the department and of great bene-
fit to the property owners of the town. II
he should possess the power, as he un-
dOubtly does, Of keeping the engine from
freezing when the thermometer is from
twelve to fifteen degrees below zero, then
it is criminal on his part to stand back and
be n fault-fnding spectator, while the val
liable property of lellOw-citizens is being
consumed 1t is much easier to stand
back and find fault than it is to take hole
and make ones self q efficient and your
correspondent, being a sensible individual,
evidently prefers Standing at comfortable
distance from the flames rather than take
hold Of the brakes, or do anything els e
that would be Of service to unfortunate
property-owesTs.
There is class of citizens here who
think that the frcmen ought to be their
protectors and defenders from all harm,
and if they fail, from any unavoidable or
unforeseen reasons, to subdue the flames in
three minutes then they are GEN.
sured BY these lazy, wouldbe-aristocrati c
grumblers, who think themselves too good
to belong to fire company.
\ majority Of the fremen here are
young men who have but little property
liable 20 be consumed by fire, while ma
jority Of the business men DO not belong
to any of the compaaie; Of the depart
ment.
a few more such unfair AMI uncalled for
criticisms as appeared in your paper las
week, will make many Of the fremcn fee
like withdrawing from the department en-
tirely and let these stuck-ap property own
ers take their chances The engine con-.
pany was badly enough N )rt;ie AMI cha
grined at the failure OF the engine at th'
last fire, without being censurel in the
manner that :" Citizen" did. lie and ev
cry other citizea Of tn, Plac. w,s alike
interested in extinglisiing the flames
and the man that is too lazy. too inaifer
ent, or too much stuck-up to belong to the
department, has 10 right to iiul fault witt
those who are willing and do the best the!
can to save property.
We have only about half as many mem
bers III the engine company as we ough
to have, and therefore there is splendid
opportunity for Z" Citizen to make him
self " efficient"
FIREMAN.