![]() "Theft and damages are a problem," says Pawlak, who adds, "I don’t have readily available data regarding a potential recent increase," when I note the seeming increase in social media posts about thefts. Now that the system is mostly non-functional there are fewer and fewer boxes on the street every year. "In some locations the boxes are still used by the police," says City of Milwaukee Department of Public Works’ Electrical Services Manager Bryan Pawlak, who works in the Infrastructure Services Division of Transportation Operations-Electrical Services, Communications.īut, Pawlak says that rumors that the disused boxes sometimes serve other functions, involving streetlights or traffic signals, are untrue. Each fire alarm box, when activated, would transmit to firehouses a code that, when matched to a specific card in a file, would identify the location of the box and the companies expected to respond.įor a time there were also combo police and fire boxes.Īt one time there were more than 2,500 call boxes dotted around the city, hard-wired into a network of cables that covered more than 500 miles. There have been multiple designs over the years and there were also red fire alarm boxes, too, that allowed anyone to call in an emergency with a little click. The heavy cast-iron boxes perched atop tall bases contained telephones from which police and school crossing guards could call in to their local precinct house, in the days not only before cell phones but before two-way radios. ![]() ![]() We wanted them to be something to be proud of. ![]() Like lamp posts and fire hydrants, the old police call boxes that once stood sentinel on street corners all across Milwaukee have been such a part of the landscape for so long that many people don’t even notice them.īut for the folks that do, they’re a treasure, reminding us of the continuity of city life here and, thanks to their decoration, of a time when we wanted even mundane things to not only work well but to look good. ![]()
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