Good Friday in Sebastopol

For nearly 100 years the Victorian country and city fire brigades have raised money  for the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne. Here is the Sebastopol brigade, CFA volunteers, out collecting on Good Friday.

This is the original station building, with additions, which was moved over the road from its first site sometime in the early twentieth century.

The brigade began in 1868, about 6 years after the Ballarat brigades began, and within 4 years of the establishment of the Borough of Sebastopol. Like  most of the CFA brigades that have been fighting the fires around here the last few months, it remains a largely volunteer organisation. 

The Sebastopol brigade didn't have horses, so until motorised engines came in, the firemen ran and pulled their equipment along the streets of Sebastopol to put out fires.

For more pics of Sebastopol, have a look here