Siren call silenced

Whitefish stops longtime 10 o'clock curfew whistle

It had the power to stop the Whitefish City Council from talking, if only for a minute or so.

It also beckoned youngsters for most of Whitefish's history, telling them it was time to be off the streets and go home.

The 10 o'clock nighttime siren in Whitefish is gone, silenced by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. The familiar wail of the siren is too loud for the newly hired crew of firefighters on board for the city's conversion to round-the-clock fire and ambulance service.

"Before we had people living [at the fire hall] it wasn't a problem," Whitefish Fire Chief Tom Kennelly said. "But their living quarters are right next to the siren."

The noise level exceeds the federal limit, and the National Fire Protection Association, which likewise has a health standard for "hearing conservation," also takes issue with the sound level, he said.

Public Works Director John Wilson said the first he heard about it was at the June 15 City Council meeting when council member Turner Askew asked the group if it had noticed what was missing.

"I was amazed I hadn't noticed," Wilson said. City Manager Chuck Stearns said he didn't know whether the siren would be restarted once firefighters move to their new digs at the Emergency Services Center on Baker Avenue.

"If it were reactivated it would stay downtown," Stearns said. "We'll see how the council feels."

MANY longtime Whitefish residents are feeling blue about the loss of their beloved siren.

"Is nothing sacred?" Whitefish native Mike Muldown asked. "Haven't they heard about ear plugs?"

When Muldown grew up in the 1950s, youngsters jumped into action if they were downtown when the siren rang.

"We lived at the corner of Fifth and Spokane, and I'd be downtown with the Street brothers and all the other town kids, and when it rang I could sprint home and make it in the door by the time the siren wound down," Muldown recalled.

"It was Mayberry in those days," he said. "'Pappy' Joe Eason was the police chief, and they were a pretty easygoing bunch. I can't recall anyone going to reform school" if they stayed out past 10 p.m.

Flossie Fletcher likewise can't recall a time in Whitefish without the siren.

"When the curfew blew, we'd all run home, if you were under 16," she said. "I'm 77 now and I don't remember a time without it. I miss it terribly. It's just sad."

The siren began blowing in October 1919 when the city imposed a law known as the "Ding-dong Ordinance," Whitefish historian Walter Sayre said. It rang at 9 p.m. back then; two years later it was switched to 8 p.m.

The 10 o'clock siren was instituted with a new ordinance in October 1944, Sayre said.

But even before the curfew siren, Whitefish had a fire whistle to alert volunteers, he said, noting early documentation that officials tested the city's first siren at 2 a.m. to see how far the sound could carry.

Sayre said it doesn't seem right that OSHA can tell Whitefish what to do with its time-honored siren.

"I just want to say how stupid this all is," he said.

ALTHOUGH many people are lamenting the siren's absence, Kennelly said he's had "just as many people say they don't miss it" because their dogs aren't barking and their babies aren't waking up.

The siren also has startled many tourists, he added, because it's the same sound that warns people in other parts of the country of an incoming tornado.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by e-mail at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com