Built in 1880 in Grand Rapids, on the bank of the Grand River, Engine House No. 5 served the community with a horse-drawn steam pumper and a hose cart. At the time of her construction, she gleamed in white brick with red courses, towered and turreted in almost Byzantine splendor. When it was built, horse-drawn pumpers would race to the fires eventually the horses were replaced with motorized fire trucks. Sadly on the station’s 100th birthday in 1980, she was slated to be torn down. By demolition time, her brick had been painted Tuscan red, most of her decoration covered over with plaster, and her usefulness was at an end. But this once-noble structure wasn’t leveled by a wrecking ball; rather, it was taken apart brick by brick and moved. Today, it rests-restored to her Victorian splendor-in the town of Allendale west of Grand Rapids, and is the Engine House #5 Museum
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