Fire Marshal
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Fire Marshal - In the New York City Fire Department and a number of other North American firefighting services, this title is applied to men and women who investigate fires. They are members of the fire department, and they must have firefighting experience, but they are also sworn law officers. They carry a handgun, wear a badge, and make arrests (frequently of arsonists).
There are over 11,000 firefighters in NYFD and 40,000 policemen in the city's three police forces (municipal, transit, and housing). But there are only about 100 Fire Marshals and 40 Supervising FIre Marshals. The Marshals work in pairs and investigate all fires. In a typical year they are assigned about 4,000 fires within the five Boroughs of the city.
The first Fire Marshal was George H. Sheldon, who was appointed in 1873 and earned a substantial $3,000 a year. (The Fire Department only became a professional department in 1865; prior to that it was a volunteer service).
Over the years the city evolved from a single Fire Marshal to a Fire Marshal with first a single Assistant, and then a number of assistants. The structure of today's Bureau of Fire Investigation has evolved. There is a hierarchy: a Chief Fire Marshal, Assistant Chiefs, Supervising Fire Marshals, and Fire Marshals.
FIre Marshals conducted a number of important investigations, including the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire of 1911. They also work with Federal, State and local law enforcement, because arsonists are frequently involved in other criminal activity as well, and some investigations, like the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, require multiple agencies' skills.
In 1946, the year Jackie Robinson became the first black major league baseball player, the Bureau of Fire Investigation more quietly made integration history when a five-year veteran firefighter, Robert O. Lowery, became the first African-American Fire Marshal. Lowery would ultimately rise to the top of the department, being appointed Fire Commissioner by Mayor Abe Beame in 1965.
Until 2001, no Fire Marshal had ever died in the line of duty. That changed on September 11, 2001 when Marshals Ronald Paul Bucca and James Devery rushed into the World Trade Center to try to assist fire victims -- and get a head start on the investigation. (They had worked on the 1993 investigation at the same site). Devery led a wounded woman to safety, but Bucca perished.
In 2003, budget pressure forced the Bureau of Fire Investigation to close its Bronx and Queens offices, and cut back the operating hours of the Manhattan office. Fewer than half the Marshals that were on hand in 2002 now answer calls (the surplus Marshals have retired or returned to conventional firefighting duties). But 4,000 calls will still come, this year and every year, and the Fire Marshals will do their best to answer them, in the tradition of George Sheldon, Robert Lowery, and Ron Bucca.