Polk County news. [volume] (Benton, Tenn.) 191?-1983, 1919-01-30
FIRE COMP ANIES
AMONG FARMERS
Become Members of Voluntary
Organizations With All the
Necessary Equipment.
PLANNED BY COUNTY AGENTS
Estimated That Quarter of Million
Dollars Worth of Grain Was
Saved Last Year-Wider Field
of Usefulness Seen.

A smoke smudge on the horizon in
the country no longer means certain
and complete loss.
At least, this is true in $4,000 square
miles of California where 5000 farm
ers have enlisted in rural fire COM
panies, equipped with trailer fire
carts, stationed at strategic points and
ready to meet the fire peril when it
appears. The plan was developed by
the county agricultural agents, in Co
operation with the forest service of
the United States department of agri-
culture, and il is estimated that
quarter of a million dollars worth of
grain was saved through it during the
summer of 1918. The plan was de-
vised for the purpose of reducing
losses in grain fields and on grass
ranges but department of agriculture
specialists believe it might be given a
much wider field of usefulness in the
protection of practically all kinds of !
farm property from loss by fire.
Under the California plan the |
county farm bureau becomes the CEN
trail fire protection agency. A local |
FIRE company was formed at each COM |
munity farm bureau center, and the |
members pledged themselves to re-
Epond instantly to the call of fire.
Each community elected a fire boss"
who was commissioned as a deputy
state fire warden, and "fire dis
patcher," whose duty it is to remain
at the telephone during fires to give
information and obtain help.
TraiIers Carry Equipment.
In most of the communities q two
wheeled trailer fire cart was obtained.
These trailers are of simple construc-
ton, may be attached to any automo-
bile, and are completely equipped with
chemical fire extinguishers, water
cans filed with wet sacks, with forks
and shovels, and with cOntainer for
drinking water for the fire fighters.
The trailer is kept at the cross roads
or other most accessible point in the
community and the first automobile
passing on the way to a fire bitches
to the trailer and takes it along. Out
of the 366 rural fire companies organ
ICED in California last year, 257 are !
equipped with such trallerS.
TIE saving of quarter of million u
dollars in single season in this L
limited territory is an indication Of
what might result If the plan were t
adopted in communities y
where conditions are such as to make W
II workable. There are some rural u
where such a plan might IL
not be advisable, but in the majority, IL
perhaps. it would be workable. Prior o.
% the extensive spread of the farm II
bureau system, which came primarily III
IS a war measure during 1917 and OF
1913, it would not have been possible | III
ince il is necessarily n cooperative III
activity. But the farm pl
,ureau system has come to stay, and u
t affords the sort of cooperative ef-
ort of which community fire protec- SO
ion may well he part Ut
Similar Need Elsewhere. !"
Throughout dozen or more states,
here exists need for protection
gninst fire in grain and grass fields,
t thrashers, and the like, similar to po
hat in California. In other large areas WI
here wooded tracts are interspersed WI
18th titled fields and where woods or
res are of frequent occurrence and pc
ften spread 80 crops and buildings, ge
lere exists The same need as in the DO
grain fields. And, In the ma
,neral protection of farm buildings vel
nd fences, in hay loft and hay rick he'
res from spontaneous combustion or dir
.cident, ia fires snreadln. from burn ant