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The Howe company was founded in 1872, and built their first pumper on a
motor chassis in 1907. They were building on Ford Model T chassis in 1917,
and in the 1920s built the Howe Defender on Defiance chassis. When Defiance
production ceased in 1930 they began to make their own chassis, also called
Defender, as well as using commercial chassis such as Ford, Chevrolet and
International. The New Defender on a Waukesha-engined Duplex chassis came in
1953, with 750, 1000 and 1250 gpm pumpers, open or closed cabs. Pumpers on
commercial chassis were still made in the 1950s and 1960s. In 1967 came a
new custom cab-forward chassis with Detroit Diesel engine and open or closed
Cincinnati cab, still called the Defender. In 1974 Howe acquired the
Oren-Roanoke and Coast companies.
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ad in 1953 Silver Book pp84
Many trucks released by the Willys factory as pickups or "stripped
chassis" were adapted by after-market manufacturers including the Howe Fire Apparatus of Anderson, Indiana. These conversions also included Forward Control fire trucks built from
the cab-over-engine trucks produced by Willys from 1956-65.
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