Grinnell / General Fire Extinguisher Company

In the late 1860s, while serving simultaneously as treasurer for Corliss Steam Engine, manager of Jersey City Locomotive, and superintendent (and later controlling shareholder and president) of Rhode Island’s Providence Steam and Gas Pipe Company, Grinnell became acquainted with the complexities of fire protection equipment. His Providence Steam and Gas Pipe was contracted in 1869 to install the then-standard fire extinguishing apparatus – perforated pipes – in several massive cotton mills in Lowell, Massachusetts. Fire was a significant concern for cotton mills of the 19th century. Mill buildings were notorious for poor ventilation; mill owners were concerned that changes in humidity would weaken cotton fibers. As a result, the air inside mill buildings was thick with highly combustible cotton dust and lint, creating a serious fire hazard and dangerously and unhealthy working conditions for mill workers. Invented in 1806, the perforated pipe system was widely regarded as both essential and inefficient. The pipes were not automated, and the system caused water damage and depleted water supplies. 

Grinnell turned his attention to the problems associated with perforated pipes in the 1870s. Meanwhile, Henry Parmelee invented an automatic fire sprinkler to install in his Mathushek Piano Manufacturing Company factory of New Haven, Connecticut. Parmelee’s system generated such high demand within the textile industry that he formed the Parmelee Sprinkler Company and retained Providence Steam and Gas Pipe in 1875 to install the systems. Grinnell helped modify Parmelee’s sprinkler models, making them more cost effective and heat sensitive. By 1878, the two men agreed that Providence Steam and Gas Pipe would manufacture Parmelee sprinklers on a royalty basis. 

Grinnell patented the first “sensitive sprinkler” in 1881. By 1890, his sprinklers were installed in more than 10,000 buildings and were credited for extinguishing over 1,000 fires. In 1883, Grinnell merged two competitive sprinkler companies into his Providence Steam and Gas Pipe, creating the General Fire Extinguisher Company. By 1906, due to Charlotte’s rapidly growing textile and manufacturing industry, Grinnell’s company had opened a branch office in the Queen City. Originally headquartered on North Tryon Street with a North Charlotte plant, the General Fire Extinguisher Company consolidated operations at the West Morehead Street site in 1929. After weathering the Depression, the firm became The Grinnell Company in 1944. ITT purchased the company in 1968, later selling its Fire Protection division to the Tyco Corporation in 1976. By 1999, consistent with the general decline of the former West Morehead Street industrial corridor, the company had relocated to South Tryon Street.