Remembrances/Stories

Omnibus Home Page - WiWashin Home Page

This portal contains remembrances/stories which add a personal flavor to the history to the town, its villages and its people.

Beer Running Truck
Fire Engine

### Prohibition Brought Short-Lived Era Of The "Beer-Running Truck"

(Shared by Fred Aicher Sr. of Richfield through his niece Dawn Aicher. Originally published in Yarns of Yesteryear The Country Today, 20 March 1996)

In 1930, when I was 16 years old, my brother John was 18 and he got a job at a garage on Highway 41, now call Highway 175. One day I stopped in at the garage and went to the back door. Nobody knew I was around. To my surprise, I saw a big truck from about 1920. It was painted dark green or gray, the tires were very wide and high. It had single tries on a single rear axle. The truck was a flat platform truck; the platform was about 8 feet wide and about 12 feet long. The load on the platform was about 4 to 5 feet high. It was covered with a heavy canvas tied down with ropes. The load was flat on the side and top. I knew then that it was a beer truck.

I only stood in front of the truck. The hood was down, the door on the cab was closed and no tires were flat, it just stood there. It might have been parked there until night. I do not know if anybody saw me. Maybe they thought the rear door was locked. I never said anything to my brother about what I saw. I did not want to get him in trouble. I was in the garage less than one minute and was glad that no one saw me.

My brother only talked to me once about beer trucks. Maybe he was told to keep quiet. He told me that one day, when a beer truck was in for repairs, he found a billfold with $1,200 on the truck running board. He gave it to the driver.

One driver told him that if one of the two loads got there without being caught, they would break even. It could be that the $1,200 could have been the pay for one load of beer. My brother told me that the load was about 4 to 5 tons. That was a heavy load for a single axle. I think the reason that they used old trucks was because they were cheap. If they got caught, they would not lose much money.

A friend of mine had an uncle who had a farm also on Highway 41 (175). Across the road was a garage and he knew that it was a beer truck repair shop.

The beer trucks had help from the law, but if they (authorities) got paid of not, I do not know. It was said that the law would sometimes see that the beer trucks would get to the town of Menomonee Falls in Waukesha County – it supposedly was run so "wide open" that almost everyone knew what was going on.

These are just two of the many unusual goings-on that I witnessed during the time of Prohibition.

top

### Farmer Takes Care Of Fire Engine

(By Loren H. Osman; Special to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel; published 1994; shared by Dawn Aicher)

Richfield – After long service in southeastern Wisconsin communities fighting fires, thawing pipes and just missing being born again to a riverboat, a steam-powered fire engine has would up in the tender care of Fred Aicher, a semi-retired farmer and hobbyist.

Aicher, 80, says the horse drawn rig was bought new in 1907 by Cedarburg, after a house there went up in flames and the city found it had inadequate fire equipment. By 1928, the pumper had puffed its last at fiery blazes. It was then acquired by Wauwatosa, which used it as a source of live steam to thaw frozen sewer pipes. Later, the engine rolled onto Pewaukee, where it performed a similar role.

When those duties were complete, someone bought it, thinking the old potboiler could power a riverboat. Those plans never materialized, and the pumper passed on to other private hands. In 1969, while waiting for his then 16-year-old son to take his driver's license exam, Aicher spotted the venerable steamer, rusting and rotting, in a Hartford alley. He bought it, hauled it to his small farm a few miles away on Highway 167 and rebuilt it, not for more fire fighting, just for reviving the past.

Restoration included replacing all four wheels with new, hand-shaped wood. The front wheels were four feet in diameter and had 16 spokes, the rear ones five feet in diameter and with 18 spokes. After replacing the driver's seat and making other repairs, Aicher repainted the rig a brilliant red.

Finally, Aicher built a handsome canopy for the old fire engine to protect it from the weather. He slyly lettered it "Richfield Volunteer Fire Department," bending history a bit.

But who's to complain after the authenticity Aicher has faithfully recaptured? Obviously not his Richfield neighbors. And out-of-town visitors are more interested in buying the jumbo pumpkins Aicher raises than in how he brought back to life a fire fighting rig of nearly a century ago.

top

Omnibus Home Page - WiWashin Home Page