Engine Company 5

340 East 14th Street | East Village | built 1920

Open on the map5 entries

Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.

1. 1881

   March 1

   Napoleon LeBrun & Son builds a new firehouse for Engine Company 5

   Napoleon LeBrun & Son, the Fire Department's official architects, design a Queen Anne firehouse with Neo-Grec touches for Engine Company 5, and the company moves in on March 1, 1881. Construction takes under six months. The red-brick building, trimmed in terra cotta and stone, replaces the volunteer-era station on the site, built around 1862.

   Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

2. 1895

   February 12

   Engineer Peter McKeon is killed when his engine's tender crashes into him

   Responding to a fire at the Florida Flats tenement, Engine Company 5 loses a wheel, and the engine's tender slams into engineer Peter McKeon, its pole piercing his back and pinning him to the boiler. Rearing horses pull the pole free, and he falls into the street and is trampled. He dies within minutes, at age 45, leaving a wife and four children.

   Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

3. 1897

   December 22

   Firefighter Martin Oakley dies after being overcome in a gas-filled cellar

   Engine Company 5 is called to a tenement fire at 436 East 14th Street, where gas has built up in the cellar. Several firefighters who go in after their colleagues are also overcome. Martin J. Oakley is the last to be pulled out, and he is dead.

   Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

4. 1974

   Firefighter Jim Ronayne joins the Metropolitan Opera's 'Tuxedo Squad'

   Three nights a week, Engine Company 5's Jim Ronayne swaps his turnout gear for a black tuxedo and goes to Lincoln Center. He is one of nine firefighters in the Tuxedo Squad, which keeps watch at Metropolitan Opera performances. The detail calls for help from Roosevelt Hospital at least twenty times a season for accidents and illnesses.

   Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

5. 2001

   September 11

   Firefighter Manny Delvalle Jr. is lost at the World Trade Center

   On September 11, 2001, Engine Company 5 hauls hose up the North Tower toward the 80th floor, and Manny Delvalle Jr., 32, carries an oxygen tank. He stops at the 10th floor to give a woman oxygen and is never seen again. A bronze plaque honoring him hangs on the firehouse facade.

   Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

Further reading

• The 1881 Engine Company 5 - 340 East 14th StreetDaytonian in Manhattan
• 340 East 14th StreetVillage Preservation: East Village Building Blocks

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All 572 buildings with stories in East Village