141-year-old fire bell receives new life, tells history of Montgomery

The first fire bell ever used in Montgomery when it was chartered as a city in the state of Minnesota was erected in 1884. That bell, now 141 years old, has new life instilled in it thanks to the efforts of local citizens and a collaboration of businesses.

Local businessman and historian Dale Ruhland is the primary coordinator of the project. He also helped heavily on the restoration of the Settler’s Cabin in Memorial Park and the restoration painting of the Chief Beer mural on the Montgomery Brewing Company building. Ruhland had the inspiration to restore the bell when they started working on the cabin in 2020 because the bell sat in front of the cabin on a cement pad with no yoke or information.

Montgomery public works employees removed the bell in the summer of 2022, and it was stored in Roger Heyda’s blacksmith shop on 1st Street South, between Oak and Milwaukee Avenues until it could be placed back in front of the cabin in the summer of 2024. No one seemed to know the exact origins of the bell or its history though, although Ruhland had suspicions that it could be the original fire bell.

Ruhland, with the help of Larry Trnka, started researching the bell to find out where it came from. Trnka spent many days in the Messenger’s back room looking through past issues to find pieces of information about the bell.

A memory of a photo sat in Ruhland’s thoughts from pre-1904 that showed Westerman Lumber on 1st Street, the first fire station, and the original fire bell and structure. The photo was owned by Arnie Kukacka. When Kukacka passed away, Ruhland was to acquire it, but it was not to be found. All he had was this photocopy of it showing the fire bell’s original location between the first fire hall and Westerman Lumber.

What’s interesting about the fire department’s history is that former Montgomery Fire Chief said that there was an organizing of men in 1876, two years prior to the city being chartered and four years before the first fire hall was built in 1880. The first fire bell, however, wasn’t purchased and installed until 1884.

The original fire hall was built with a bell tower and sat on the southeast corner of Vine Avenue and 1st Street. The bell was not placed tower on the fire hall though. Instead, a support structure was built next to the fire hall, between it and Westerman Lumber directly to the south of it.

The bell cost $109, roughly estimated $4,000 in 2025 with inflation, and weighed 535 pounds in total. It was purchased from the Kane Company in Chicago. In the process of renovating the fire bell, they were able to weigh the bell by itself, without the yoke, which was 360 pounds with no clapper installed.

“They didn’t place it in the hall because people of the town wouldn’t have any way to ring it then, since the rope would be inside the building,” said Ruhland. “This is why it was put next to it. That was pretty common then. Even in the new building (1898), the tower was offset from the building, presumably so the rope could be hung outside the building so they could ring it.”

One of the stranger things is that, of the photographs that are available, there is not one that shows proof of the bell in the 1898 fire hall nor a rope extending outside of the structure. Ruhland believes that it is possible that maybe the rope didn’t go outside of the structure since telephones were available by that time and someone may have called the department to have them ring the bell. Those details are unclear.

The original fire bell sat in its place on 1st Street South until sometime between April and May of 1899 when J. J. Tarba was hired to move it. The bell presumably stayed on 1st Street though, perhaps being moved slightly to the north. The original fire hall was sold and moved to be used elsewhere in May 1899.

A new fire bell was purchased and installed in the tower of the 1898 fire hall sometime in the later months of 1904. The Dec. 30, 1904, Messenger said, “The old bell in the tower on First St. will be removed to East Montgomery. This move will certainly be appreciated by everybody, as heretofore when a fire broke out in East Montgomery, a telephone call had to be sent in from where a general alarm could be given, which always delayed matters, and gave the fire too much of a start. There has been a new engine house built on the East Side and the bell will be erected near that.” Ruhland believes the railroad line through town to be distinguishing between Montgomery and what was known as East Montgomery.

More research is being done into the location of the bell when it moved to the east side and Ruhland thinks that he has identified a property only a block or so away east from where it was that it may have resided.

After this point, the location of the bell is unknown until more recent years. The yoke and structure supporting the bell went missing. Ruhland said, “It’s possible that the significance of the bell saved it from being scrapped.” It’s plausible to think that the structure surrounding the bell was scrapped, perhaps during WWII when all available scrap metal was melted for the efforts of the war.

Record hasn’t been found yet of when the bell moved to the concrete slab it sat on in Memorial Park by the cabin. “I remember playing around on it as a kid,” said Ruhland. “That’s at least 60-some years already.”

Both bells were likely not used anymore beginning in the mid-1930’s. The first motorized fire engine was bought by the fire department in 1931, according to former fire chief Kenny Pavek. In 1935, the first siren is noted as being erected and “tested” by the city, and it was presumably used regularly shortly thereafter.

The 1904 bell resides now in front of the current city hall and fire department, which was erected in 1974. The 1884 bell rests now in front of the Settler’s Cabin in Memorial Park, feet from where it has sat for decades, thanks to many volunteers and donors.

“Our goal was to put it (the bell) close to its original spot. When they (the city) dug out the footing of the original spot, the concrete was five feet deep, and they had to use a payloader to get it out,” said Ruhland. “The spot where it rests now is actually about five feet over from its original location there because of the fresh soil.”

Period-correct uprights were purchased from someone local and the correct yoke was identified and purchased from someone in Texas to bring the project all together.

The bell was metalized, or coated with a thin layer of rust-proof metal, to protect it from the elements for another 141 years. The clapper and rope are kept separate and brought out to ring the bell on special occasions, such as Kolacky Days.

In addition to the bell being refurbished and erected again, a period-correct light pole was installed in front of the bell and Settler’s Cabin both for visitors at night to see but also to discourage vandalism of some of the town’s earliest pieces of history.

Total monetary costs for the project before donations was $7,447, which was all paid for by donations. Total estimated costs including donated materials and labor comes to a little over $24,000.

Ben Krenik in coordination with Cemstone in Montgomery donated the concrete that was poured and the labor to do so for the base. Bob Krocak, Jr., bored the underground wire to the cabin and new light pole. Ron Pexa, an artisan welder, donated his time to restore the period-correct light pole next to the cabin. Roger Heyda and Bill Hlavac did the scroll work on the bell structure and Hlavac also did the concrete forms for the base. Mark Kline donated much of his time welding and assembling the historic bell, with parts coming from Brosamer Bells in Michigan. Ruhland Electric donated their material and labor to do all the wiring to the cabin and light pole. Metalizing of the bell was done by Larry Stuckmayer of J.L. Metal Finishing in Dundas. Ruhland said, “Rick Krenik and Larry Trnka gave a significant part of their summer to see this project to completion.”

Ruhland credits the help and coordination of the City of Montgomery, as well as the many volunteers, and donors, including Minnesota Valley Electric Cooperative, Montgomery Community Foundation, Southern Minnesota Initiative Foundation, Montgomery Knights of Columbus Post 1573, and more. Any funds that were gained in excess of what was necessary Ruhland says will go to maintenance of the cabin and bell as necessary.

“It is apparent that without every one of them, this project would not have happened. We are humbled and grateful,” said Ruhland.

Significance of bells

The significance of bells in the past are something more meaningful than what a bell is used for today. “They used to use them to let people know of deaths, whether they were male or female and would ring them the same number of times as the person’s age,” said Ruhland. “In a community of this size, if you knew if it was male or female and the age, you probably knew who it was that died.”

Ruhland also said that it was used to let people know the time of day, such as the church bells in Heidelberg, Minn., were rung at noon and 6 p.m. to let farmers working outside know meal times. “Fast rings or the number of rings meant different things. Different bells also had different tones so people could distinguish between the fire bell and a church bell,” said Ruhland.

Bells are one of the earliest forms of communication, dating back many centuries. They were used to indicate, time, worship, fire, and other things to signify large amounts of people over an area. “People paid attention to a bell much like we do when the phone rings. This was the first form of mass communication for Montgomery,” said Ruhland.

Correction notice: The print edition of this story went to press with a few errors in names that were in photo descriptions attached to the story. Those have been corrected here.