Matt Swartz rolled open a bay door at the Schuylkill Historical Fire Society Museum in Shenandoah to reveal some of the organization’s antique apparatus.

“These are our pride and joys here,” said Swartz, the group’s treasurer.

With more than 40 pieces of apparatus dating back to the 1800s displayed at the Shenandoah site and 100 more at the society’s Mahanoy City warehouse, its collection is world renowned.

“This is if not the biggest — it was the biggest — non-privatized collection that I know of in the world, next to the L.A. County Fire Museum,” Swartz said. “I think at one time we had the most pieces of apparatus.”

Not only that, part of the collection is housed at the former Columbia Hose & Steam Fire Engine Company No. 1. The 1880s building at 105 S. Jardin St. is already impressive with its original hardwood floors and pressed tin ceilings. But without a doubt, the unique apparatus on display adds even more.

“This is what makes the museum so much better: a fire museum in an old firehouse,” Swartz said.

The oldest piece, a 1809 Pat Lyons hand pumper, occupies a corner of the firehouse.

“You don’t see this anymore,” Swartz said.

The 217-year-old piece has wooden wheels and glass hurricane lamps, and it is thought to be the only original one remaining.

Heavy with copper and brass, the pumper was used by the Friendship Hose Company of Orwigsburg — Schuylkill County’s first fire company — and had been displayed at the Philadelphia Fire Company for years.

The museum also houses a 1909 Ahrens steamer, just one of the several horse-drawn pieces there.

While the oldest date to the 1800s, other pieces span the years, by manufacturer, make, model and purpose. They spill over to an adjoining garage once used for Shenandoah Borough equipment.

“Look at these, you can’t replace them,” Swartz said.

Restoration

Society volunteers restore the antiques to their original splendor, making major or minor repairs depending on what’s needed.

Once done, the antiques sparkle.

“We take them, we clean them up, polish them, get them squared away with paint,” Swartz said.

Many were used by local fire companies in places like Tamaqua, Mahanoy City, Girardville and Pottsville. But others in the collection come from other cities, states and countries.

“When this started, we were only going to do Schuylkill County — hence the name,” Swartz said of the society’s 1999 founding to preserve the area’s firefighting past. “But it kind of took off from there.”

The museum even houses an antique Japanese pull cart, complete with conical “helmets” woven of a straw-like material.

“We get everything from everywhere,” Swartz said. “It’s hard to maintain that stuff, but a lot of it is running.”

Helmets, jackets and boots line other trucks — almost as if the pieces are ready to respond to flames.

“We try to keep everything as most original as we can,” Swartz said. “That one has the old buckets on it, like the bucket brigade.”

The museum typically hosts one open house annually, but Swartz said volunteers plan to add a second one this year.

It invites fire companies, schools and organizations for tours and brings visitors from near and far.

“We also invite SPAAMFAA (Society for the Preservation and Appreciation of Antique Motor Fire Apparatus in America). It’s basically like the firetruck collectors of the United States and around the world,” Swartz said. “They were just here last summer, so we had a really big event then and they loved it.”

Preservation

Another highlight is the original — and still operational — Gamewell fire alarm telegraph system. Installed in 1890, the alarm hammers an in-house bell, sounds an air horn and punches out a numeric location of the fire onto rolled paper when someone pulls a “fire box” in the borough.

Displays and exhibits of fire equipment and memorabilia are housed on the second floor of the museum, a spot that once served as offices for the Shenandoah Police Department. Jail cells are on the lower level, and at one time, the former Columbia Brewery kept barrels of beer on an upper floor.

Visitors can see fire alarm pull boxes, antique fire extinguishers and flashlights, brass fittings and nozzles from long ago, and wooden water mains and old radios. The fire company’s meeting room, with antique table and chairs, remains.

Downstairs is the social room and bar used by the Columbia Fire Company before it moved to a new site on West Center Street. The watering hole is original, right down to a functioning “trough” that runs along the length of the oakwood bar.

“Newer” fire apparatus — machines built after 1950 — are inside the Mahanoy City warehouse. Trucks are parked side by side and row by row in the sprawling 33,000-square-foot former General Cigar factory.

They are from near and far, and include two New York City Fire Department trucks that were used during the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

“Not all of it is owned by the museum; some of it is owned by private collectors as well,” Swartz said, noting that some enthusiasts rent spots at the warehouse.

The society, however, continues its mission to preserve history, and members can often be found at the warehouse repairing trucks.

For more information, visit the society on Facebook or www.theshfs.org.