{"id":272627,"date":"2026-08-26T15:40:16","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T15:40:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/272627\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T15:40:16","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T15:40:16","slug":"tower-behind-erie-chamber-of-commerce-building-gets-scrapped-but-historic-group-saves-old-siren-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/272627\/","title":{"rendered":"Tower behind Erie Chamber of Commerce building gets scrapped, but historic group saves old siren"},"content":{"rendered":"

A tower behind the Chamber of Commerce building in Erie\u2019s Old Town has been disassembled and removed from the spot where it sat for decades. The tower\u2019s historic siren, which was once used to alert the Erie community to danger, will be preserved.<\/p>\n

With \u201cno historical value,\u201d the tower has been scrapped, but the siren will find a new home at the request of the Erie Historic Preservation Advisory Board, according to a town announcement.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe siren tower stands behind the old Erie Town Hall building, now home to the Chamber of Commerce. The tower was removed Monday and the siren will be preserved. (Courtesy photo \/ town of Erie)<\/p>\n

The chamber\u2019s building at 235 Wells St. was the original home of Erie\u2019s Town Hall, where the town\u2019s fire truck parked, according to the announcement.\u00a0The tower has been standing since the mid-1900s, when Erie installed a World War II surplus air raid siren to alert volunteers to respond to active fires and other emergencies.<\/p>\n

The siren was installed at the top of the \u201c30-foot tower that looked like an oil rig,\u201d Lew Holloway, an author with the Erie Historical Society, wrote in 2024<\/a>.<\/p>\n

About the siren, Holloway added that \u201cthe idea was that with the loud siren sounding, everyone in town could hear the blast. Those on call would rush to the town hall to serve and protect.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe town had the brilliant idea of using different impulses (sounds) for emergencies. I only remember two, but long, continual sounds were fires. Three short impulses were to get the local police officer to call the telephone office,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Ahead of alleyway improvements, crews\u00a0removed the tower Monday. More details about the siren\u2019s relocation will be provided once the preservation plan is finalized.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A tower behind the Chamber of Commerce building in Erie\u2019s Old Town has been disassembled and removed from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":272628,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[1675,1676,7250,6838,136,138,137,1677,114728,241,182,139,1680],"class_list":["post-272627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-erie","tag-boulder-county","tag-colorado","tag-colorado-news","tag-east-county","tag-erie","tag-erie-headlines","tag-erie-news","tag-front-range","tag-historic-photos","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-weld-county"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272627\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/272628"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}