The following article was originally published in the May 1893 edition of The Southern Architect , and was written by Edmund George Lind (1829-1909), professionally known as E.G. Lind, a British-born architect who spent most of his life and career in Baltimore, but practiced in Atlanta from 1883 to 1893.
Here, Lind offered his ideas for the prevention of building fires, a chief concern for both architects and the general public in the late 19th century, when dangerous wood-burning fireplaces were the primary method of heating, and deadly fires were tragically common.
Architects of the era were always eager to employ “fireproof” design solutions, and Lind specifically recommended the use of terra cotta flue liners in chimneys. Flue liners are now considered essential for fire prevention, yet as Lind noted, they were not in common use at the time, and would not be widely adopted until mandated by national building codes in the 20th century.
In early 1890s Atlanta, when construction was almost entirely unregulated, the city’s leading architects frequently called for greater government oversight of the building process, due in large part to fire safety concerns. In 1890, Thomas H. Morgan, a partner of the architectural firm Bruce & Morgan complained to a reporter of The Atlanta Constitution:
“Why take the matter of defective flues. Chief Joyner [W.R. “Cap” Joyner, Atlanta’s first fire chief] reports that last year forty-two of the fires were caused by defective flues, and the loss was $18,000. This sort of thing would be stopped if we had the right kind of building law. There has hardly been a board of building inspectors in the last five years that has not recommended to the council some sort of building law, but none was ever adopted and the thing goes on in this careless fashion. Time and again in my work of supervision I have had to make them take joists out of chimneys.”1
In the same news article, another Atlanta architect, G.L. Norrman, offered his own design solution for the construction of safer chimneys:
“There should always be eight inches of brick around flues where the brick touches the woodwork. It takes more brick, but it is the only safe way to build a chimney, and I always put it in the specifications. Architects, as a rule, do not build chimneys large enough. Usually they only put four inches of brick between a flue and woodwork. That is not sufficient.”1
In this article, Lind recommended that the local government hire a ramoneur to examine and clean every chimney in the city on an annual basis. Appealing to Atlanta’s pathological need to compare itself to other municipalities, Lind noted: “The plan is in operation in other cities, and Atlanta cannot well afford to be ‘out of the swim.’”
The city finally hired its first real building inspector in 1895 and began issuing construction permits that same year; it did not, however, hire a chimney inspector.
“Protection Against Fire“
“It is worthy of remark that more fires occur at the commencement and close of the cold winter months than at any other period of the year. This may be accounted for from the fact that the accumulated soot of the preceding winter, having been driven by wind and rain into corners and crevices of the chimney flue conveniently left by the bricklayer, as if “on mischief bent,” readily takes fire upon the first warming up, ending ofttimes in widespread conflagration.
A clean chimney flue would obviate all this, but how to clean it is the question.
It is perhaps not commonly known that zinc chips or scraps of zinc plate burned in a stove will readily cleanse the stove-pipe of all accumulated soot. The same cleansing process might be applied to ordinary fireplaces, but in the absence of all such precautionary measures, and as a valuable auxiliary, I would suggest the creation of a new officer to our city staff – that of chimney sweeper, or “Ramoneur,” which sounds better whose duty it shall be to examine every house and public building in the city during the summer months, and have each chimney flue properly swept and cleansed at a charge to the owner or tenant of say fifteen or twenty-five cents for each flue, the soot to be removed by the operator and used as a fertilizer on the neighboring farm lands, thus preventing fire consumption on the one hand and raising food for man’s consumption on the other.
This plan is in operation in other cities, and Atlanta cannot well afford to be “out of the swim.”
The sweeping can be readily effected by a round brush of whalebone or split rattan fitted to a bamboo rod three or four feet in length furnished with a screw joint, to which other rods may be attached, thus gradually forcing the brush up the whole length of the flue, first enclosing the fireplace opening after adding the second length of rod by means of close fitting canvas, in the center of which is a small hole for passing in the different sections of rod and operating the brush.
When the top of the chimney is reached, which may be readily ascertained by the Ramoneur or his assistant watching outside, by working the brush well around the flue all loose soot will be detached and the brush may be gradually lowered, disjointed and packed away for future use. The soot brought down to be put into close canvas sack and removed from the premises with little or no inconvenience to the tenant.
In some cities a wire brush is used, weighted with lead or iron, and let down from the top of the flue, instead of starting at the bottom as here recommended, but the great objection to this method is the roughness of the apparatus, which frequently detaches mortar from the sides of the flues, and opens the way for future mischief by exposing defective joints. In this connection we would remark that the best shape for all flues is a circle, and the best material for building them is vitrified clay or terra-cotta. These pipes may be made without collars or socks, should be glazed on the inside, and as they are put in place and enclosed with the brickwork they can be protected from falling mortar by a wooden mandrel or covered core, which may be removed as each fresh joint of pipe is fitted and then replaced.
The use of terra-cotta pipe for smoke flues is no new thing. The writer, in common with many other architects, has availed himself of them for years, and it would be well if their adoption was as common as the reverse is now the case. Little or no soot can cling to a glazed surface, and the joints are so few – less than one-eighth the number in a brick flue – that risk of fire from defective work, as well as the certainty of avoiding a smoky chimney would be almost obliterated.”
E.G.L.
References
- “Eight Millions More”, The Atlanta Constitution, April 13, 1890, p. 7.