Niagara (Volunteer) Engine Company #5

About this Property

#Redevelopment

This adorably stout former fire house has had short periods of its life without occupants, but generally quite a history of tenants. Built right after the Civil War (April 12, 1861 to April 9, 1865), the building served as a firehouse for the Niagara company. The Niagara company started as a volunteer company but became paid city employees.

The fire company occupied and used this facility up until around 1950, when it shows as vacant in a Sanborn Map.¹ By the 1956 map, though, the building is labelled with an “S” for store.² By then it was converted to commercial use. This is likely around the same time that the first floor façade on the western side was rebuilt and modified.

From 1983 to about 1990 the building was home to Computopia.³ The 1988 photo shows those signs on the firehouse. It was then converted to a food store called Firehouse Food Store starting in 1994.⁴ We are unsure how long this business lasted.

By 1998 Miko’s, a sex-positive adult store, moved in.⁵ They lasted almost 10 years at this corner, moving across town by 2007. Sometime before 2002 the property was part of a Ten Most Endangered List, heralded by the Providence Preservation Society. We say that because in a 2002 news story it was mentioned as a success story, where highlighting the building led to new investment in it. It was likely listed before Miko moved in.

After Miko’s moved out, the building was vacant from 2008 to 2011. Google Streetview shows activity converting it to the current tenant in 2012.

#Current Events

Jerry’s Art-a-rama moved early in 2012 from the former Vesta Knitting Mills in the Jewelry District and has been there since.

#History

From firefighter historian Henry Cahoon

Members of this company became involved in fisticuffs with other companies and a civilian in 1853 whilst the Arnold Block burned. Behavior like this was not uncommon, but this finally led to the city taking control of the fire companies and forming the country’s second paid fire department.

FireNews lists this retired station as #17.

From the “Industrial Sites and Commercial Buildings Survey (ICBS)” by PPS and the AIA, 2001-2002

This highly articulated, two-story, brick and stone building has a tall campanile with a corbelled top, dichromatic radiating voussoirs on the arched windows (including a Palladian window on the front), and a bracketed cornice below the slate hipped roof. To the north is a three-story hose drying tower. According to the National Register nomination, the first story was partially rebuilt in the 1960s with a modern storefront in place of an earlier one. The storefront, set off from the upper story by a cast iron lintel, has a central entrance recess and large vertical mullioned display windows to each side. A one-story, brick, gable-roof ell projects from the rear of the building.

The building is one of the earliest structures built during the city’s post-Civil War municipal improvements campaign and was one of four new engine houses built to accommodate the change from hand-engines to steam power (Doyle Avenue NR). As a firehouse it was home to Steam Engine Company 5. John W. Briggs did the masonry work, and the carpenter for the project was Freeborn Johnson. Underneath the building was a water cistern with a 50,000-gallon capacity. The building’s use as a firehouse ceased in 1950 (Woodward 1986; RIHPHC data sheet). The Providence Fire Department erected a series of modern fire stations across the city in the 1950s, vacating this building around this time. Engine Company No. 5 was acquired by restaurant designer Morris Nathanson from the Providence Redevelopment Agency in 1973. The building was rehabilitated in 1973 by Morris Nathanson, whose design and architecture offices occupied the second story. Today it serves as a commercial building and is home to Miko Exoticwear.

From the National Register Nomination form for the Doyle Avenue Historic District, 1990, prepared by Amy S. Jordan

653 North Main Street Niagara Engine Company #5 (1867). A 2-story, stone-trimmed brick structure with a slate deck-on-hip roof. The first story was partly rebuilt in the 1960s with a modern storefront in place of an earlier one. This storefront, set off from the upper story by a cast-stone lintel, has a central entrance recess and large vertical-mullioned display windows on the front and part of each side. Above the lintel is a Gothic arch marking the location of an original central doorway surmounted by a single arched doorway on the first floor and a tripartite arched window on the second floor. The building is trimmed with a rusticated granite base and a brownstone beltcourse. The window and doorway arches are composed of alternating granite and brownstone radiating voussoirs. Heavy wooden brackets support the eaves. On the north side of the structure is a 3-story hose-drying tower, also of brick and topped by stone and brick corbels supporting a squat, slate, deck-on-hip roof.

One of the earliest structures built during the city’s post-Civil War municipal improvements campaign, this was one of four new engine houses built to accommodate the change from hand-engines to steam power.