Old Joe is a fire truck that has been, and still is, an important part of the department and is now being rebuilt by the firefighters that work there.
In 1933, a two-ton Dodge Graham Bros. truck was purchased in Detroit by Pleasant Grove and driven back to Pleasant Grove by some firefighters. At the time, it was a simple flatbed truck.
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The firefighters modified and built it into a fire truck by fitting it with pumping components, ladders and a 500-foot hose reel.
“Everything was built by the Fire Department. They bought the parts and pieces,” said Jake Larsen, one of the firefighters helping rebuild the truck.
Nobody knows how the truck got its name. “Back then, a lot of fire apparatus had names instead of numbers,” Larsen said.