Perth Amboy evening news., 1920-11-27
THE HASKIN LETTER
DON'T HAVE FIRES
BY j. HAsKIN

once exist. This was before the fire.
Everybody you meet here tells you
so. Praise any feature of the city
it's gay restaurants; its beautiful
bay; its marvellous Golden Gate
Park: its pretty girls; its delicious
fish: it's charming Preside, or its
picturesque Chinatown-and while
the praise will be pleasantly well
coined. IL will Immediately be quail
flied with: "Ah, but you should
have seen them-or it-before the
hre!"
The term Earthquake" rarely
enters into h conversation when
discussing the disaster which oc-
| Cured in 1906. The tactful visitor
carefully avoids 1t, and the San
Franciscan ignores it. No one de-
mics that an earthquake did give
the city a slight jar in that momen-
tous year, but it was the fire which
followed that caused the damage.
AL tina the quake did was to knock
over a few lamps and at the same
time break the water mains, thus
at one blow causing the fire and de-
stroying the means with which to
fight it.
In at least one respect, therefore,
the new San Francisco, which rose
phoenix-like from the ashes of the
old, is better than it's predecessor.
II is practically invulnerable against
fire. No second lesson was needed.
Everything hat could be done has
been done to prevent another catas-
trophe, and San Francisco today is
one of the best fi~re-protected cities
in the world. Another quake may
knock over as many lamps as it
pleases, but the city will never go
up in flame as it did before, because,
aside from the fact hat most of IL
is now largely f~ireproof, an intricate
system of water connection has
been established so thai il the water
mains are broken or fail at one
place, or even at evera places,
there will still be plenty of other
sources to be tapped.
A Complete System
Shortly after the fire in 1906 a
bond issue of five million dollars
was raised for the construction of
this system. In the first place there
is a high-pressure water supply,
furnishing $50 pounds water pres
sure from three storage reservoirs
located in the hills of the city-one
at an elevation of 1926 feet, one at
400 feet and still another at $50
feet. In these reservoirs twelve mill
lion gallons of water are stored for
fire%-ighting. In addition there are
two high-pressure pumping stations
capable of pIfmping 10000 gallons
of water per minute each from the
bay. These stations. housed in
strictly fireproof buildings, are so
equipped that they could operate
for a stretch of -four days, if COM
pletely shut off from the rest of the
city. The system also has a con-
nection with two steel fire boats in
the harbor. which can pump water
into the high-pressure hydrants
when the supply of fresh water be-
comes exhausted.
Furthermore, any section OF the
city can be cut off from the rest ie
Ii becomes necessary To concentrate
the water supply. II a pipe should
break in any section, this could be
Immediately shut oft by valves.
These valves are located at every
street crossing, so that the city can
be segregated a block at a time.
Located in various sections, more
over, are one hundred cisterns con-
tanning anywhere from 10000 to
100, 900 gallons of water each, SO
that If all the water mains should
break and every other source of
supply become exhausted, the fire
department would still have these
to fall back upon. But even this is
not all. The law requires that every
tank in San Francisco holding five
thousand gallons of water must
have a special connection with the
city water system, in case the fire
department should need to use it.
Inasmuch as most of the large Office
buildings have such tanks for sup
plying running water and drinking
water to the various offices, they
constitute a valuable reinforcement
to all the other water resources.
Nc city has stricter laws on the
subject of fire protection thar San
Francisco. Every building of four
stories or more must have a fire.
escape. All two-story buildings op-
Grated for public use must be sup
piled with them, and any building
over one-story in which ten or more
women are employed is required TO
be so equipped. Every building in
which oil is burned must be sup
piled with an automatic cutoff, or
If it hasn't one, the plant must be
under the supervision of a compe-
tent person, who cannot be absent
more than twenty minutes at a time.
Only three types of buildings may
be erected: Type A which is
strictly flre-proof; type "B" or re-
inforced concrete. and type &c"
consisting OF heavy timber or steel
framework, and mason exterior. In
some sections of the city shingle
roofs, which are particularly frown-
ed upon by the fire department, are
prohibited.
Fire Protection
In addition to all these precau-
lions. the city maintains a very effi-
cient Fire Prevention Bureau, which
deluges the schools with fire preven-
ton literature. and which is now
carrying on an astonishingly com
prehensive scheme for bringing
every residence and building in San
Francisco under the immediate SUI
pervision of the Fire Department
Every city block is now daily inves-
tigated by the firemen of it's district.
On the first visit, a sketch of the
house and store and building is
made and turned into the Fire Pre-
vention Bureau, which is gradually
compiling a huge Block Record. In
other words. a diagram of every
building in the city is to be on file
in the fire department. 81 that upon
the breaking out of a fire in a cer-
tain building on Post street. for ex-
ample, the fire department can turn
to this number in their files and see
! exactly what kind of a place it is
where it's entrances and fiues are.
how many people it contains. what
il is used for.
With firemen %patroling the city in
the cause of ire-prevention, as po-
licemen patrol it in the cause of
crime-prevention. life and property
in San Francisco are becoming safer
and safer. Every little detail about