Ye Olde Fire Laddies
YE OLDE FIRE LADDIES
Dr. Paul Loatman
Mechanicville City Historian
The alarm rang out at midnight on a cold December night, summoning firemen who quickly began to lay hose at my corner. Nearby, a two-family house was “fully engaged.” Howling wind sent cinders flying, threatening other residences. Quickly, hydrants were opened as firemen evacuated adjacent homes. Acting with “purposeful and orderly haste,” volunteers confidently performed their duties with no apparent stress.
As the flames broke through the roof, a volunteer climbed a ladder projected at a 45 degree angle and began feeding a stream of water onto the inferno thirty feet from his nozzle. Surely, I was not alone in hoping and praying the fire would not suddenly back-draft his way. It was now one-o’clock in the morning and with the wind-chill dropping below zero, spectators stomped their feet to keep the blood flowing.
When 977 residents petitioned the County Court of General Sessions to incorporate “Mechanicville” as a village on April 18,1859, their first order of business envisioned the creation of a volunteer fire department. Lewis E. Smith, the oft-elected President of the Village Board in its early years, organized a hose company bearing his name. But, failure to incorporate reduced it to a mere bucket-brigade with a hand-pumper providing protection for the American Linen Thread factory at the mouth of the Tenendehowa Creek. Smith’s initiative was a classic case of enlightened self-interest: while protecting his own investment, he also was preserving the community’s largest employer. Before moving to eastern Massachusetts in 1882, the operation had regularly employed ten percent of the Village’s population for over three decades. The failure to activate the “Lewis E. Smith Hose Company” should not tarnish its sponsor’s escutcheon, however, when we recognize that larger communities were no quicker in adopting modern fire-fighting techniques than Mechanicville.
New York City had imported two fire engines from Holland in 1730, yet fire protection was limited to hand-pumpers for the next century. Lacking municipal water systems [Philadelphia created the first in 1819], firemen had to pump water from wells, ponds and streams, or as here, from the Champlain Canal. Steam fire engines were invented as early as 1829-1830, but they did not supplant hand-pumpers for another two decades. Boston introduced telegraphic fire signals in 1852, a year before Cincinnati organized the first salaried steam department, but these changes were slow to be adopted elsewhere.
Despite New York City’s innovations, Gotham relied on volunteer bucket brigades until 1865. Arguably, Mechanicville advanced the cause of modernizing fire-fighting through its native-son, Elmer E. Ellsworth. The future war hero gained fame in the 1850s organizing military drill-teams that toured the country. Many of his Zouaves were “fire laddies,” young men from the lower social orders who divided their time between fire-fighting and street brawling. At times, their hopes of reaping rewards tempted them to drum up business by starting small conflagrations. Luckily for many city fathers, as well as the future Union Army, Ellsworth “civilized” these rambunctious young men by turning their unbounded energies toward more positive goals than “lighting and fighting.”
Locally, the seed planted by Lewis Smith finally took root when forty-four men entered their names on the roles of “Washington Engine Co. # 1” on June 3,1875. The company moniker derived from the hand-pumper it purchased from Fred S. Button of Waterford for $560.00. The Village Board also authorized the building of an engine house, killing two birds with one stone by incorporating a “lock-up” in the two-story building erected on property donated by the Linen Thread Company. It also prohibited winter drainage of the Champlain Canal to preserve a ready supply of water to fight fires on the West Side.
Meeting with popular approval, twenty-nine new members stepped forward to join the company in December, 1878. However, an equal number were expelled simultaneously for undisclosed reasons. This marked the first of many controversies that have arisen throughout local fire history. The Village Board at this time granted $500.00 tax exemptions to firemen; limited membership to those over the age of 16; and permitted the “drafting” of males over 16 present at fires to aid volunteers in an emergency. Reluctant slackers were to be fined $5.00 for failure to comply. It is worth noting that despite all of these initiatives, the Village had created a fire “company,” not a fire “department.” According to an 1877 ordinance, “The Volunteer Fire Department of the Village of Mechanicville” would be created only when a second fire company had been organized. Seven years would pass before this occurred.
Charter members of “Washington Hose Co. # 1” were a hardy lot, eighty percent of them responding to muster when Mechanicville hosted the Tri-County Firemen’s Convention in 1902. Two-thirds of these men were in their twenties and thirties, none younger than 18 nor older than 45 years of age. Because most of them were recorded in the N. Y. State Census of 1875, we may sketch a collective portrait of this first fire company. Unsurprisingly, their demographic profile included five supervisors of the Linen Thread Company, four independent merchants, five clerks, four carpenters, and a painter, a butcher, and a teacher. While these are common professions today, we are reminded of how times have changed by the fact that “Washington # 1” firemen included five carriage-makers and blacksmiths. Only one listed himself as a railroader, and no one worked at paper-making, reminders that the two industries that later dominated the local economy had not yet emerged.
Failure to follow up the initiative taken in 1877 may or may not have been a matter of concern to the larger community. However, soon after arriving on the scene in the early 1880s, newspaperman Farrington L. Mead focused public attention on local fire-fighting limitations by pointedly asking his readers in 1884:
Has the Village of Mechanicville a legally organized department? If so, who are the present officers; what are the duties of the said officers and by whom are they appointed?
Rising to meet Mead’s challenge, Daniel E. LaDow sought election as Village President in 1883. The prominent businessman came to Mechanicville in 1869, and with partner A. L. Barnes, took advantage of Mechanicville’s access to urban markets and Adirondack forests to build a profitable sash and door business. As President, he spurred the Village Board to purchase a Button steamer in July, 1883, for $1700.00. He then helped organize a second fire company, aptly named the D. E. LaDow Hose Company, on April 11, 1884. On July 8, the Village incorporated the new company, thus enabling it to legally organize “The Fire Department of the Village of Mechanicville.”
Early volunteers were challenged by a midnight fire that struck the D&H Freight House on Railroad Avenue in March, 1884. First responders included pool sharks from Barney Patrick’s nearby billiard parlor hall who aided the firemen in saving two hotels and other businesses from destruction. However, a large number of goods on consignment to the D&H were lost. Window sash, doors, and blinds, groceries and dry goods, farmer’s seeds and plows, and furniture, all produced locally, were destroyed.
The LaDow Co. steamer was put to the test again two months later when a fire struck Walsh’s Saloon on William Street. Unable to crank up the steamer quickly, and forced to choose between saving the drinking hole or a house of God, quick-thinking firemen tore down a nearby picket fence they used to fuel their engine, thus preventing the fire from spreading to the Baptist Church across the street. Whether or not “dry” Baptists viewed this as an act Divine Providence is unrecorded. Yet before the LaDows could rest on their laurels, another blaze broke out a few days later, destroying the D&H passenger station, Smith’s Malt House, and Reeve’s Hotel. A technological breakthrough of sorts was marked at the time with Editor Mead reporting that Stillwater volunteers had been summoned to the scene by telephone, still regarded as something of a novelty.
How prominent a role the fire department assumed in the minds of the public at this time might be gleaned from contemporaneous stories reported in the local press. Within a few months of being incorporated, the LaDow Company captured first place at a firemen’s muster held in North Adams, Massachusetts, on July 11,1884. Telegraphing news of their victory ahead of their return home, the 100+ firemen and friends who had accompanied them to the Bay State were greeted by fireworks, followed by a late night torch-light parade through the streets of the village.
It is interesting to note, further, the contrasting treatment accorded two men of the cloth in the local press at this time. Editor Mead’s staunch Methodism did nothing to suppress his high regard for a popular Augustinian priest, Fr. Hugh McCrainor. The newsman effusively praised the cleric’s oratorical skills, as well as his taste in decorating his rectory on William Street. But, his greatest plaudits were reserved for Fr. McCrainor’s zeal in “working” the aforementioned 1884 fires, and his even-handedness in aiding both Baptists and the saloon owner. However, Mead refused to come to the defense of a Methodist cleric a few years later whose problem may have been self-inflicted. Since its erection in 1883, it had become the unofficial custom to sound alarms by ringing the bell of the Methodist Church on North Main St. Something akin to a scandal arose, therefore, when Reverend W. P. Rulison refused to play his appointed role. Stung by the community’s negative reaction to the imputed dereliction of his duty, Mr. Rulison sought justification by writing to the editor of the MECHANICVILLE MERCURY on November 25, 1887:
1. I DID refuse to ring the bell at the time of the fire at Park Avenue. I don’t consider it part of the duty of a pastor.
2. I DID offer to let others to do so if they wanted.
3. Frivolous reasons given about my refusal are improbable.
We do not know for sure how his congregation responded to this defense, but notably, the good reverend departed for greener pastures in Vermont little more than a year later. Although Mead credited him with increasing his flock during his tenure, no further support was written on his behalf when he took his farewell in May, 1889, nor did he bother to explain the “frivolous reasons” he attributed to his critics.
We might assume that this “Methodist connection” remained the order of the day for some time, given the fact the Village Board did not adopt a mechanical fire-alarm system until 1904. In fact, the governing body dragged its feet for more than two years before appropriating $2000.00 to purchase a calliope-style whistle “operated from mechanical boxes on telephone poles.” The devices were installed by the Halfmoon Heat & Light Co., NYSEG’s predecessor, in the municipality’s then-three political wards. Two blasts were issued when an alarm was pulled: the first number signaled the ward, the second, the street location of the fire. Of course, it was not long afterwards that firemen were plagued with false alarms.
Initially rejecting the steam-generated blasts that, according to Editor Mead, sounded like “a fine imitation of a coyote,” the Village Board refused to pony up an additional fee to fine-tune the system. Residents had to endure the “howling” continuously for another half century until NYSEG stopped generating steam power, except for an indefinite period when, as the Village Board’s minutes of May 24, 1909, stated: “The fire whistle may not be blown because of [the] illness of Mrs. Tho[ma]s Burke.” Whether or not Mrs. Burke survived long enough to find out, this alarm was converted to electricity in the mid-1950s. The system of geographic call numbers continued in use until the 1990s when it was replaced by today’s single alarm.
A burst of organizational expansion prompted by fires in the 1880s reshaped local fire-fighting. Two homes on Hazel [now Second] St. were destroyed in March of 1888, and five months later, the Knickerbocker Hosiery mill on Viall Avenue was reduced to cinders. These events alerted the public to the limitations of depending upon the Champlain Canal as a primary water source to fight fires on the West Side. The Hazel Street blazes also exposed the obvious dangers of laying hose across railroad tracks. More than once in its history, the department watched helplessly as on-coming freight trains shredded fire hoses.
These shortcomings became more obvious while fighting the blaze at the Ames Academy on South Main St. on September 13, 1889. Forced to drape hose across tracks and draw water from the canal, firemen were able to save only two of the prestigious Academy’s three buildings. The loss, combined with the deteriorating health of school Head, Mrs. Florence Ames, forced it to surrender its charter in December of that year. Responding to all of this, textile mill investor and West Side resident, E. H. Strang, spearheaded efforts to create a new fire company while also calling for the development of a municipal water system. The Village Board appointed Water Commissioners in 1892 and in a few years, Mechanicville had improved both fire protection and public health. Firemen now had a reliable source of water to draw from, and the public was better protected against the spread of water-born diseases such as typhoid that too often claimed the lives of young children.
Local economic expansion, rapid population growth, and fire losses in the 1890s called for expanded fire protection. A blaze at the Sweeney and Hickey Sash and Blind factory on Round Lake Avenue closed that operation for good in February, 1896. The newly-built Strang Knitting Mill on Viall Avenue was spared the following February because its owner had the foresight to install sprinkler systems in the facility. However, fate was not so kind to the historic “Tallmadge,” a hotel on South Main St. built in the late eighteenth century that had quartered engineers and workers who carved out the Champlain Canal here in the 1820s. Known variously over time as “Burnap’s,” “ The Saratoga,” and “The Tallmadge Hotel,” it had become a favorite watering hole for travelers on the old King’s Highway. Its owner, Judge William Tallmadge, a prominent local politician and property developer who laid out many of the building lots and streets on the West Side, is remembered today as the donor of the park that bears his name. Although the hotel was insured, Tallmadge decided against rebuilding, and thus, a historic link to the community’s past was lost. The still-smoldering ruins were captured in the accompanying photo, believed to be the oldest extant picture of a local fire, taken by Sidney Fort in February, 1898.
New challenges also arose at this time when the Fitchburgh Railroad’s coal fire burned for days before petering out. Fears arose about the possibility of a similar fire breaking out in the wood piles of the Duncan Paper Co. Although situated outside of village limits, the proximity of these two businesses to residences and the large economic role they each played in the community raised valid concerns. Addressing these and similar issues led to the organization four new fire companies between August, 1894 and November, 1904.
The E. H. Strang Co. was organized on October 9, 1893, and duly incorporated on August 2, 1894. Next, following the award of a contract in 1898 to the Eddy Valve Co. to install hydrants attached to the village’s new water system, voters approved the organization of a hook and ladder company on March 2, 1899. Honoring the son of one of Mechanicville’s earliest Irish immigrants, the company was named after John L. Short in August of 1899. On December 22 of that year, the W. B. Nielson Company joined the M. F. D., and following a respite of a few years, the W. L. Howland Chemical Company was accepted on November 4, 1904, completing the department’s expansion.
Amidst this rapid growth, the community decided to host the Tri-County Firemen’s Convention on Labor Day weekend in 1902. Yet, complications had developed in a number of areas. The contract to build the Strang firehouse on Howland [now Third] Avenue was originally awarded to the firemen themselves. The possibility of a conflict of interest gave the Village Board second thoughts, leading it to rescind the contract, solicit new bids, and award the job to a local builder for $2000.00. The Tri-County Convention itself turned out to be a social success but a financial bust. The large gathering of firemen and their families attracted such unsavory elements as seven wagonloads of “gypsies” more intent on picking pockets than watching firemen race up ladders. The village fathers also did not expect the forty fire companies, eight bands, and four drum corps who paraded through town to have to compete with a “Fat Woman’s Show” and a “Snake Pit” on Park Avenue, but that is the way it turned out.
When the Howland Co. joined the M.F.D. in 1904, the Village Board approved the move by a close vote of 4 to 3, reflecting the fact that many who originally had petitioned on the company’s behalf later withdrew their endorsements. Meanwhile, the Village dragged its feet in appropriating $3000.00 for the Neilson Co. Although the records obscure the nature of this controversy, ethnic conflict appears to have been a factor, since T.J. Finegan, Village President, warned that he would personally organize a sixth fire company composed exclusively of “Sons of St Patrick” if the money were not approved immediately.
In 1907, a horse of a different color entered the fray when “the Italian residents of Mulberry and Warsaw Avenue ask[ed] for a hose cart.” Although the Village Board decided to have “the matter laid over,” this issue would not die. Andrew Lenhardt joined Eugene Siciliano in petitioning the Village to establish a fire house “on the other side of the tracks.” Lenhardt, a community activist, often acted as spokesman for the Fratellenza when requesting parade permits, and in 1909, he became Chairman of the Village’s Board of Health. President Homer Eckerson, protested this appointment without explanation, but notably, the Health Board had sole responsibility for issuing burial permits, a subject rife for controversy given the wide range of funereal customs observed by Mechanicville’s increasingly diverse ethnic groups. Lenhardt later became the President of the John L. Short hose company. Whether because of, or in spite of, his multiple office-holding, voters rejected a referendum appropriating $5000.00 for the Short company by a margin of better than three to one in May of 1916. In 1917, the Short firehouse had to be closed in the middle of a coal shortage that arose during World War I.
On February 22,1919, the Mechanicville Elementary School burned to the ground, partly because firemen were unable to reach the upper levels of the four-story building. Despite its serving as a temporary classroom for some of the 550 students displaced by the school fire, on June 23, 1919, the four other fire companies petitioned the City Council 1 to expel the Short company from the M.F.D. Without comment, the City Council tabled the request on July 14, and it never surfaced again. Meanwhile, the outcast unit of the M.F.D. continued to host the displaced students until March 28,1921.
This controversy was dwarfed by far greater problems exposed during the Lynd Mfg. Co. fire in February of 1922. The firm, located on William St. and North Central, marketed plated stove fixtures and specialty items in South America. The destruction of its factory exposed the embarrassing fact that the fire department lacked sufficient hose, boots, and jackets to successfully fight fires. It did not help either to learn that Chief Mike Grimley had been forced to prevent his men from deploying the hook and ladder it had purchased second-hand in 1902 because it had officially been “condemned.”
Why did the department come up 400 feet short of hose during the blaze and have to abandon another 200 feet afterwards? It turned out that the Street Department had been “borrowing” hose for years to clean streets, often leaving it in place to freeze in winter and rendering it useless. The shortage of boots and coats also created the pathetic phenomenon of “firemen in waiting” hurrying to exchange gear with others who had fought the blaze until their ice-encrusted uniforms had to be pried off and passed on to others. The scene resembled that of a bizarre firemen’s relay race. Meanwhile, like Nero’s Rome, the building continued to burn, until nothing but a chimney and a pile of rubble remained. Needless to say, “the public was not amused.”
The Lynd fire could not have come at a more inopportune time. A sharp, short recession hit the American economy in 1922; local taxpayers were footing the bill to replace the elementary school destroyed in 1919; and a bitter year-long strike of D&H trackmen impeded recovery. When citizens demanded an accounting from City officials, Mayor John Burke informed them that the cupboard was bare. Undeterred, voters overwhelmingly passed a referendum enabling the M.F.D. to acquire two motorized fire trucks and enough gear to outfit all volunteers. One last City resolution was passed: henceforth, the Street Department was prohibited from “borrowing” hose from the fire companies.
Coincidentally, Mike Grimley also recommended that the City lay pipe in the abandoned canal running through the middle of the City and put in lateral lines connecting to the river. But the Council begged off, disclaiming ownership of the property. The truth of the matter is that City records clearly indicate that voters had approved a referendum to purchase the property on June 23, 1919. Furthermore, official minutes reveal that the old canal bed had already been renamed “Central Avenue” after voters had approved funds to convert it into a roadway.
The underlying cause of such disagreements may only be conjectured. However, when John Burke, attorney-at-law, World War I veteran, and former postwar Mayor, was appointed Chief in 1934, the action drew loud protests. Four of the M.F.D.’s five hose companies [all except the Howlands] declared that “We feel that this action affects the morale of the Fire Department and jeopardizes the lives and property of the citizens of this City.” This strongly-worded petition was politely accepted, but the Council took no action at the time. However, Burke had a brief tenure, and shortly afterwards, he was replaced by veteran Mike Grimley.
The Great Depression and ensuing manpower shortage arising during World War II tested the mettle of the department, but fortunately, not beyond its capabilities. However, after the war’s end, two Christmas Week fires created a crisis that permanently changed the community. On December 25 and 27, 1948, fire destroyed the Ames Academy apartments and Doyle Block, leaving at least twenty-eight families homeless. Housing shortages here and across the nation were common in the post-war era. Locally, concerns had been raised about the existence of sub-standard units, commonly referred to as “stuccoville,” that many feared created a huge fire threat. Thus, the Doyle/ Ames disasters exacerbated the existing housing crisis, leading a popular local union leader to ask the City to impose rent controls. Judge Howard Reilly also warned Council Members that, despite his own sense of compassion, he could not suspend eviction orders interminably. Simultaneously, the Clerk of the Mechanicville School District told the Council that if families with children were forced to move because of high rents, State financial aid to the District would drop precipitously. Over the course of the next two years, local officials met with State and federal housing personnel looking for solutions. Ultimately, these steps led to the creation of the Mechanicville Housing Authority on June 8, 1951, a direct response to the Christmas Week fires of 1948
The extent of public discussion regarding fire protection in the following decade is difficult to measure. Official minutes were not kept because the City Stenographer’s post was abolished, and when she questioned the decision, she was told: “Keep quiet. You have no right to question the Council.” Some subsequent citizen inquiries drew this official response on March 12, 1958: “The cross-examination of city officials during Council meetings will not be tolerated.” Assorted notes and memos are included in City records covering this period, but “official” minutes of Council meetings were not recorded for a five-year period. Two pages of minutes appear to have been torn out of the record book; and NO records can be found for the period from December 16, 1958 until January 25, 1961.
We may say with certainty, however, that when the City cut the fire department’s budget in December of 1962, it turned out to be a case of bad timing. Before ringing in 1963 on New Year’s Eve, the department found itself confronting a large fire in the department store/residential unit at the corner of North Main and Mabbett Streets. The building was a total loss, but neither residents nor firemen suffered serious injury. North Main Street and surrounding buildings assumed the appearance of grotesque ice palaces in coming weeks as a below-zero cold spell persisted well into January. But, there was no lack of heat when firemen showed up at subsequent City Council meetings to protest the recent budget cuts. Graciously, city fathers created a more temperate climate in the Council Chambers by restoring departmental funding to its original levels.
Throughout its long history, no topic has generated more controversy for the M.F.D. than the issue of membership requirements and the location of its facilities. As noted earlier, Italian residents appeared before the Village Board requesting use of a hose cart to protect the North End on April 6, 1907. From Mechanicville’s earliest era until the opening of the Saratoga Avenue overpass in 1976, freight trains entering and leaving the local rail yards made the area inaccessible for periods as long as twenty to thirty minutes at a time on a daily basis, some days on numerous occasions.
Beginning with the first request made in 1907 until the Howland Company relocated its facility at the foot of Viall Avenue in 1965, residents appealed to local officials at least twenty-three times to address the issue of fire protection in their neighborhood. While a full recounting of the ensuing tug of war would take too long to discuss here, examining a few such instances may clarify the nature of the dispute.
On May 22,1912, the Village Board permitted “the Italian citizens” to have their own hose cart, subject to the supervision of the M.F.D. Six days later, 145 of the 170 member department petitioned the Village Board to rescind this decision because they contended [in garbled syntax] “that by transfiring [sic] said carts/hose and nozzle to the new organization hampers and cripples the present fire companies in their equipment.” Faced with the resignation of all of the petitioners if their request was ignored, the Board was forced to immediately reclaim the hose cart it had granted to “the Italian citizens.”
The following January, Eugene Siciliano protested the firemen’s lack of response to an early morning fire in the Italian section. The Village President defended the oversight by reporting that the alarm had sent firemen to the wrong location, and finding no fire there, they left without further investigating. Later, on August 26,1913, “we the Italian residents” petitioned for the right to use hydrants, offering to pay for the use of hose carts. Officials responded, “The Board has decided that the village had sufficient fire protection and took no further action on the matter.” There matters stood for decades.
On May 23, 1947, the City Council noted that the N. Y. State Fire Rating Organization recommended that one of Mechanicville’s five fire companies should be transferred to the North End, home to one-third of the community’s residents. City Council Minutes then go on to note:
A lengthy discussion was had concerning several other issues involved in the matter, including the establishing of a fire company in that area; the advisability of moving one of the present companies across the tracks; the problem of Italian membership and the apparent disposition of the fire department members, and the embarrassing position in which the Council has been placed because of the controversy.
Later, on September 2, representatives of the North End proposed three possible sites for locating the new fire house, but as the Council’s official minutes cryptically note, “A discussion was had, but no action was taken.”
The City Council finally accepted bids to erect a new fire station “on the other side of the tracks” on October 16, 1964. We do not now if this decision was motivated in any way by President Lyndon Johnson’s signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 forbidding discrimination on the basis of "race, creed, color, sex, or national origins” three months earlier. However, in April of 1965, the Howland Chemical Co. opened its new fire station on Viall Avenue, almost fifty-eight years to the day that the Village Board had decided to have “laid over” the request of “Italian residents on Mulberry and Warsaw Avenue…for a hose cart.”
A denouement of sorts occurred some years later when the City Council proposed to merge all five fire companies at the Central Fire Station on North Main Street. At the time of its dedication on May 23, 1978, three of the M.F.D. units were consolidated and housed at the facility, while two other stations near Depot Square remained open, one on each side of the railroad tracks bisecting the City. When faced with the closure of these last two stations, residents of the West Side protested, and the City Council compromised by leaving Station # 2 open on Depot Square.
That fire I mentioned at the beginning of this article? The house was a total loss, but fortunately, neither residents nor fire personnel were injured. Notably, despite the close proximity of numerous residences to the roaring blaze, none of them suffered any damage because of the extraordinary efforts of the Mechanicville Fire Department on a bitterly cold and windy winter night.
On January 2, 1982, Harold Sheehan wrote in The Gazette: “There is humor, tragedy, success, and failure” in Mechanicville’s fire history. It has been my intent to capture some of this flavor on the eve of the 125th anniversary of the M.F.D. But before closing, I would add two words to Harold’s summation of departmental history: sacrifice and dedication. Quietly and without fanfare, men and women step forward when we, their neighbors, need them the most. We may even take them for granted, until we find ourselves in desperate straits. What would it take to replace them? Don’t even ask! Hopefully, the noble tradition they and their predecessors inaugurated at that June 3rd, 1875, meeting in the Linen Thread factory will continue for another century.
1 Mechanicville was incorporated as a City in 1915, one of two municipalities in New York State that is governed by City Commission, Saratoga Springs being the other.
[This article was written for publication in THE INDEPENDENCE DAY JOURNAL issued by the Mechanicville Family Day Committee on July 13, 2008.]