Franklin County, Ohio Siren Discussion

[fire_freak_57]

Allegedly, the 2 STL-10s in Montplier, Ohio [Williams County] are from the old Franklin County Civil Defense System.

They are, along with several others. I have the articles saved somewhere and they're also on the map in that section.

[Josh R]

I have a map based on what was included in the old emergency operations plan's master list for the old siren system. Many sirens were moved around or replaced. The transition to radio activation and the Whelen system began around 1991 with the installation of WPS-4000-4's and the 3000s that had been ordered in 1989. All 110 sirens from the old system are included, types where I have been able to verify them. The following siren types were included in the old system, according to the EOP as revised in June 1990 edition. The following is quoted from the EOP (stuff in boldface are my own comments):



I will make a much longer post/thread with information at some point when I have time. I am very busy and typically do not frequent the board much anymore. Hope this helps. Can't post images/screenshots of the page from the EOP as this forum I remember does not allow me to post files, so I hand typed it as it appears on the copy.

Here is the map as it appears now (it is a work in-progress ID'ing remaining units as old aerial photographs are not always available): https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/edit? ... sp=sharing

Wow! That is some very interesting information! Great work! Just one question though... where are those black and white, vintage aerial photos from the map from? I've looked on Historic Aerials and Google Earth and neither of them have imagery that's that clear. Could you tell me where those images are from?

Sure! These images were taken from the Ohio Department of Transportation's aerial imagery archive. You will need to download the KML and open it in Google Earth Pro. Smaller image tiles show more detail, whereas larger tiles are more zoomed out and do not.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of areas in which I can't identify things even with this helpful tool; but it has come in handy mapping some of the legacy systems of Cleveland, Youngstown, Dayton and Columbus with. Other great places to check for historical aerial imagery is your county's GIS map; these can commonly be heard on your county fiscal officer or auditor's website. Sometimes county GIS maps are on the County Engineer's web site (most major counties have them, but not all).

You're most likely to find tiles near major highways, as the primary purpose of this imagery was so ODOT could review aerial images of the area prior to and following road construction and infrastructure projects.

I'd recommend opening one year at a time, otherwise the archive can freeze and crash the application due to the sheer size of it.

Here's the link to the archive: https://www.dot.state.oh.us/Divisions/E ... uests.aspx

Thanks so much Kurt! This has really come in handy! I have some findings (not in Franklin County) to report on shortly.

[Fletch]

I had no idea there were Thunderbeams in the FC system.

I wonder if Upper Arlington chose Thunderbeams because they look more aesthetically pleasing than other models?

[fire_freak_57]

I had no idea there were Thunderbeams in the FC system.

I wonder if Upper Arlington chose Thunderbeams because they look more aesthetically pleasing than other models?

Pretty sure it was just whatever was recommended from Franklin County Disaster Services (what EMA used to be called), or whatever they could get a grant for. A couple of the Upper Arlington beams replaced older sirens which were relocated when the beams were installed in April or May of 1984 there, from what I could gather from the city's meeting minutes.

The following is quoted from Upper Arlington's minutes from Oct. 11, 1982; discussing the purchase and installation of three new disaster warning sirens, and the relocation of 1 existing unit, purchased in the 1970's (it's not known whether or not the following recommendation was adopted or acted upon following this in-full, but later would fit with the city saying they had 7 sirens by the late 1980s).:

Equipment Necessary to Implement Option Three:
1. One 10 h.p. mechanical 360 degree rotating siren located at Kingsdale Shopping Center (existing).

2. One 7.5 h.p. warning siren located at Jones Junior High School (existing).

3. One 10 h.p. rotating warning siren located in the parking lot of Riverside Methodist Church (new).

4. One 10 h.p. rotating warning siren located at Windermere Elementary School (new).

5. One 10 h.p. rotating warning siren located at Burbank Elementary School (new).

6. One 7.5 h.p. warning siren relocated from Windermere Elementary School to Greensview Elementary School (existing).

Note: Normally 10 HP units designated in this manner would indicate Thunderbolts, however aerial archive imagery has confirmed all of the new 10 HP sirens listed above to be Thunderbeams. It appears that most of the newer 10 HP rotating sirens installed throughout Franklin County from 1984 onward were Thunderbeams, based on what can be found from aerial imagery, council minutes, resolutions and ordinances, and news articles.

The Thunderbeam at Windermere School was relocated to the Reed Rd. Fire Station in December 1986 (according to EMA's documents) due to noise complaints (this one replaced a 7.5 HP siren; the 7.5 HP siren was installed in 1975 according to the ordinance authorizing its purchase along with the Kingsdale Shopping Center Thunderbolt). The reason for the noise complaints were because the city thought at the time that the sirens produced the same sound output as the siren it replaced since they were both similar in horsepower. (source: 1984 minutes, quoted below).

Quote from Council Minutes, July 23, 1984:

Mrs. Rosemary Kennedy, 2451 Haviland Road, appeared before the Committee relative to her request to relocate the disaster warning siren at Windermere School away from area residents.

The Acting City Manager presented a site plan of Windermere School and defined various factors of height, structural implications and power requirements, which determine the "ideal location" of a siren. In this regard, Mrs. Kennedy suggested relocating the siren to the central-most portion of the school building, away from area housing.

In response to questions from the Committee, the Acting City Manager reported the new sirens differ in appearance only; output remains consistent at 10-horsepower. Power would be available if the siren was relocated to the school with no change to area coverage. Expenses to relocate the siren would be in the neighborhood of $2,000 to $2,500.

Safety Committee was unanimous in its recommendation to pursue an alternative location at the Windermere School area and directed staff to initiate discussion with the Board of Education.

In consideration of relocating the siren prior to school opening, Safety Committee recommended the expenditure of $2,000 to $2,500 to effect said relocation to Finance Committee.

Mrs. Kennedy should be advised of further consideration of this item by Safety Committee.

Mr. Jenkins reported the siren, originally located on the school building, was relocated to a pole. In answer to President Moore's question, Mrs. Mead noted optimum positioning for such a siren is on a pole; however, staff has not indicated there would be diminished effectiveness if the siren were moved back to the school building.

It's important to note, that as seen in the 1982 minutes quoted above the 1984 ones, that the previous siren at Windermere prior to the 10 HP Thunderbeam being installed in April 1984 was NOT 10 HP; but rather 7.5 HP. For whatever reason, a typo or misnomer was made in the report by the Acting City Manager or the Stenographer at the meeting.

The other Thunderbeam on Chevy Chase at Northwest Park was also slated to be relocated to the top of a building nearby, but the building owners declined to have a siren placed there at the last minute, and so that siren ended up just staying where it was. That siren indirectly replaced a 7.5 HP unit which was located at Burbank School, and later moved to Greensview. It ended up being replaced by a new siren in April 1984 as well; this new siren was installed behind the Advent Lutheran Church, at 3660 Kenny Road.

Norwich Twp. (now Hilliard) also had a couple Thunderbeams, and there was one in Westerville that was later moved in 1990 to Merlin Drive, where the 4004 that was swapped with a dual tone controller is now. (Source: Columbus Dispatch)

One of the Thunderbeams went to Edon, OH in Williams County, as they obtained several sirens from Franklin County at auction in 1992, likely around the same time that several communities around Cincinnati also obtained sirens from the same auction.

I have a suspicion that some other counties may have received older sirens from Franklin as well, but I'm not going to state them right now as I currently have no evidence to back that up, and will need to do some following up to see whether or not my hypothesis is right or not.

I also found out the last old siren operating in the County was the Thunderbolt in Gahanna at the former Mifflin Twp. Complex at 218 Agler Road (the Mifflin Cemetery) was replaced sometime in early-mid 2010. Details from that ordinance are listed below (the final action/passage date is listed as 5/3/2010:

WHEREAS, Gahanna has the only remaining Thunderbird warning siren in Franklin County at Mifflin Cemetery, and it is the oldest siren in the county and it must be replaced; and

WHEREAS, parts are no longer made for the Thunderbird siren and if it becomes inoperable a replacement would take approximately 12 to 14 weeks to receive and install; and

WHEREAS, the Director of Emergency Management has recommended we replace it with a new Whelen siren model 4000-4 as soon as possible; and

WHEREAS, as tornado season approaches it is imperative to have a working warning siren in that area for the safety of Gahanna residents, and all for the preservation of the public peace, property, health, safety and welfare;

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT ORDAINED BY THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF GAHANNA, STATE OF OHIO:

Section 1. That funding in the amount of TWENTY THOUSAND DOLLARS ($20,000) is hereby supplementally appropriated from the unencumbered, unappropriated balance of the General Fund to Account No. 101.215.5596, Emergency Management, Capital Projects/Improvements, to cover the herein costs.

Section 2. That ORD-0001-2010, passed January 2, 2010, is hereby amended to reflect this supplemental appropriation.

Section 3. That this ordinance shall be in full force and effect immediately upon passage by this Council and on date of signature approval by the Mayor.

That's all for now. I have much, much more information about some of the Gahanna and Upper Arlington units specifically, but it's too much and too long of information to all include in here. I will hopefully get the drive folders of all the city documents up for public viewing at some point, once I can add all of them to the folder.

[Fletch]

I would like to nominate fire_freak_57 as the poster of the year.

This information is so cool. I appreciate your time and effort!

[nvanw27]

I would like to nominate fire_freak_57 as the poster of the year.

This information is so cool. I appreciate your time and effort!

I second this motion, I have yet to see a post from him that isn’t thought out and well researched with documents and information pertaining included. Hats off to Kurt for the amount of effort being put into the project.

[fire_freak_57]

Need some assistance on some of these siren sites here, as I can't quite figure out what's what.
There's some things on this list that are listed as sirens, but the image tiles are a bit too blurry for me to make out what's there.

I'll start with #54: this siren is listed as follows on the master list from the late 80s (this master list ends revisions around 1987, so assuming it's from around 1987-1988):

Siren#: 54
Ohio Bell Telephone (O.B.T.) #: 1-BS1-21-Sta 1
Location: 1460 Obetz Rd., - Hamilton Twp. Firehouse - roof

In 1979 imagery, I'm seeing something here on a double pole mount (assuming it's a Model 5/7 of some sort, could always have been a Sterling though):

hamilton twp firehouse 1979.PNG (539.73 KiB) Viewed 9896 times

Any ideas on what's shown in the '79 imagery (above)? You'll notice this is on a pole and not the roof, so something happened to this siren later on, and the imagery from 1989 (below), seems to confirm that:

Hamilton twp firehouse 1989.PNG (698.61 KiB) Viewed 9896 times

I can see something on the roof but can't quite tell what it is... any ideas? The double pole seems to be gone here.

In the future, I am going to attempt to make some public records requests to the Franklin County EMHSA about the old sirens, as I'd assume they still have old records on hand. I'm trying to see if I can figure as much out on my own as possible, as I'm sure they're quite overwhelmed with the ongoing public emergency (Covid) that's been going on for the past year and a half now, so if anyone's got leads or ideas, I'd love to hear 'em. The problem with ODOT's imagery is that in some places, it's pretty spotty at best, given the photos were to be used for road construction projects.

I start my fall semester tonight at college and my schedule is chock full of emergency management classes this semester, so I'm not sure how much time I'm going to really have to work on this project, but I'll try to check things every so often in my free time. Thanks again!

[fire_freak_57]

Got some slight updates here...
I got some stuff from the Columbus Metropolitan Library the other day, as I now have full access to the archives of the Columbus dispatch. Unfortunately, the photo of the downtown Thunderbolt it seems is lost with time (and I'm referring to a photo of its location when it was moved from Neil House to the University Club at 40 S 3rd St., an article that ran around 1986. I did reach our to the folks at the Dispatch, and they did look through their archive and were unable to find the print of the photograph. The Library only digitally archives newspapers from 1985 onward as text-only; although I'd assume they may have copies on microfilm from then somewhere). It stopped working in 1990 March and came down when the bldg was demolished. Anyhow, I did find a few photos of some stuff here!

40 s 3rd st info.PNG (107.93 KiB) Viewed 9841 times

Info from when the downtown Thunderbolt stopped working in 1990.

3265 mckinley article for map.PNG (841.36 KiB) Viewed 9846 times

Model 5 @ 3265 McKinley. I was surprised to see this as an article here from 1952. I'm not sure if it was replaced with a larger siren later on, but it'd explain why I couldn't see anything like a Thunderbolt in aerial here.

As for the Thunderbolts, here is what I have gathered:
- Initial units (9-10 total), were installed starting in 1952 June with Neil House. This followed with installation of units at North American Aviation (4300 E. 5th Ave.), and Eshelman's Grainery; 4200 Sullivant Ave. The jailbars in Grove City and South High School in Columbus probably were installed later or around the same time. According to the Neil House article (1952 June), Columbus received these initial T-Bolts from Federal Enterprises of Chicago in shipments of three, which were delivered 3-4 weeks apart, if I recall correctly. (If I'm not correct, I'll check the articles I have saved and update this post accordingly; sorry, I'm bad remembering things off the top of my head)
I'm assuming the siren located on the Ohio State School of the Blind (a 1952 Thunderbolt) was relocated here later on, probably in the 60's or 70's. I haven't been able to uncover anything stating that unit is original. It was not uncommon for Columbus & other CD systems around the state to occasionally "play musical chairs" with their sirens, moving them around to other sites where it was believed coverage would be improved, instead of paying for new sirens to supplement existing units.
- More units (believed to be T-Bolts, based off HP) (simply referred to as "10-horsepower sirens"; the STLs/Model 7's would be the 7 1/2 HP sirens) were installed in the 1960s (my article here states "11 new 10-hp sirens will be purchased and smaller sirens relocated at outer edges of the county") - 17 May 1960
- 1974: Plan for installation of 17 new sirens in the county, and relocation of 11 older sirens
-1975: More 10 HP units added. I don't recall how many Thunderbolts were installed at this time (I'll check what my articles I saved said and update this post accordingly later), but most of the suburbs still lacking sirens and/or coverage got them around this time. 17 new sirens were added; several existing relocated; most of the 10 HP type (T-Bolt); I do have a bid for at least 1 7 and 1/2 HP unit however.

As long as you folks keep reminding me to post, I'll dump more of the stuff I've found on the dispatch archives.

The siren installed at Truro Twp. FD #1 in Reynoldsburg in 1975 was a used Model 7. (article below). I originally had thought they'd retained their STH-10 they had in the 50s when one of their stations was constructed; but this does not seem to be the case.
Edit: Can't post the article in full, will share a PDF link to it: https://drive.google.com/file/d/18y-efq ... sp=sharing

1980s- Gahanna's Allertor is purchased in September of 1980. It would be installed at the Church on Stygler Road; I believe this is in the vicinity of the subdivision mentioned here:

The Columbus Dispatch 22 September 1980.png (171.24 KiB) Viewed 9846 times

That's all I have as far as updates for now (at least in brief). Still going through a lot of the archive, and once this COVID wave winds down and the burden on our EMAs has been eased, I am going to try filing an FOIA request for additional records on their old sirens, but I'm surprised at the sheer amount I've been able to turn up just with a library card for the Columbus Metro Library. In contrast to the Cuyahoga County Public Library and the Dayton Metro Library & the Youngstown archive, Columbus actually has a decent amount of records archived pertaining to their siren system.

PS - Dug through the print archive for info on the unit I posted about above: Siren#: 54
Ohio Bell Telephone (O.B.T.) #: 1-BS1-21-Sta 1
Location: 1460 Obetz Rd., - Hamilton Twp. Firehouse - roof

According to Dispatch articles, this was some type of older fire siren, I believe. It's always possible the older siren was moved elsewhere and something new was added later. If I had to take a good guess, I'm going to go out on a limb and guess this was probably a Model 7 or something, as those seemed to be relatively common at the more rural fire departments.

[Xt22]

That is some good info fire_freak. Thanks for sharing! It's cool to see all the new things I didn't know about the Franklin county system.

[Fletch]

1973 was the first year the CD sirens were used for a tornado warning thanks to the request of Mayor Tom Moody. That year had a record number of tornadoes.

A 1952 article said that the initial system was planned to have "9 10-hp Thunderbolt sirens for a basic pattern" and "forty-four fill-in sirens ranging from 2 1/2 hp to 7 1/2 hp in size."