R.A.G. New York

It’s April 5^th in Albany, 1870. The Tweed Charter is established, getting rid of state control over the city of New York. What was called the Metropolitan Fire Department until then became known as the Fire Department of the City of New York.

May 21^st, New York City: The new Board of Fire Commissioners ordered that MFD be removed from all Fire Department clothing and apparatus and be replaced by FDNY, just as the Charter said, even though it was never explicitly mandatory that this be done in such a way. NYFD could have possibly been used.

So it is in part thanks to the Tweed Charter and also the Fire Commissioners who followed it to the letter that everyone wears FDNY t-shirts instead of NYFD t-shirts.