Arthur "Smokestack" Hardy Fire Museum

Arthur "Smokestack" Hardy Fire Museum

Arthur "Smokestack" Hardy (April 2, 1901 – December 4, 1995) was a volunteer fire fighter, photographer, black fire historian and collector of fire memorabilia (fire buff).

He was the first African-American firefighter in Baltimore, Maryland. There is a museum of his collection of fire related artifacts in West Baltimore curated by Guy Cephas, a fellow Retired Auxiliary firefighter. Baltimore has named one of their fire stations after him.

The collection of museum quality artifacts include an alarm gong, call boxes, signs, hoses, photographs, fire engines models, lanterns, bells, and water buckets. Copies of newspaper articles, photo prints, helmets, badges, calendars, correspondence and fire patches from departments all over the world round out the collection.

As of September 30th, 2019 the collection now resides with the Fire Museum of Maryland. Funding is being sought for cataloging and digitizing the collection to make it available and searchable on the internet.