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The original leather water buckets in
our collection reflect the primitive methods used to fight
fires during the first hundred years of American history.
The first line of attack on fires was the bucket brigade.
Volunteers would form two lines between the water source and
the fire. One group would fill each bucket and pass it forward
to the next person in line. That person would pass the full
bucket to the next person in line, and so on. Eventually,
the bucket would be handed to the person closest to the fire.
That person would throw the water on the fire, hand the empty
bucket to the nearest person in the return line, and then
grab the next full bucket as it arrived at the end of the
line. The empty buckets would be handed to each person in
the return line till they reached the water source, and the
cycle would be repeated continuously. If the water source
was relatively close to the fire, each volunteer would fill
a bucket and run to the fire to throw the water on the flames,
and then run back to refill the bucket.
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