Sommerville Station/ Station 3
First opened on October 15, 1955, it was located at the corner of the west side of Sommerville and Beatrice streets, near Tecumseh Avenue. Alderman Gordon Attersley, Fire Chief Ray Hobbs, Rev. H. V. Cleverton, Alderman John Dyer (who was acting for Mayor Down) were assigned to Oshawa’s third fire station at the time. Chief Hobbs increased the number of the department’s firemen to 96 firefighters on October 1, 1957. That same year, he introduced the new concept of “water fog” in Oshawa’s firefighting scene.
Sommerville Station was remembered by a participant in the Oshawa Museum’s Reflection of Oshawa project, whose father served at this station. Now standing as part of a neighbourhood, this participant recalled, “It actually looked more like a house in the neighbourhood than a fire station.” She says that it was structured in a bungalow design.
Her father worked in the small station and quiet residential area for a few years. As there weren’t many calls, he found that time passed quite slowly on some of his shifts at Sommerville.
With information from:
Reflections of Oshawa participant, Oshawa Museum archival collection
Daily Times-Gazette (Oshawa Edition), 15 Oct 1955, p. 1
