Tubular Fire Escape

I attended school in an old three story brick school house. On the side of the building there was a tubular fire escape connected to the third floor. The picture on the left is of the school I attended but the fire escape is not visable in this photo. The photo on the right is not the school I attended but it shows a fire escape that was similar.The one at my school was a little higher and steeper since it went to the third floor.

I really felt like this was my own personal slide. In the summer months it was one of my favorite places to play.  I would climb up the slide on the inside and then slide down it. I would do this over and over. For some reason, maybe because it was covered, this slide was very slick and you would come down at a fast and fun speed. It wasn’t always easy to climb to the top because of how slick it was. I would have to put one foot on the left interior wall and one foot on the right wall. I could not climb up with my feet at the bottom, as they would slide out from under me.

After I climbed to the very top, I would have a choice to make. Would I take the fun trip down or would I enter the door that was positioned there? This door was never locked and was an entrance to the third floor study hall. From the study hall I had access to the whole school.

Probably three or four times a summer I would enter the school this way. I would be very careful doing this by making sure that no one saw me enter the fire escape. I would operate as if I were getting ready to commit the crime of the century. I suppose I did this because I knew that I would be in trouble if I were ever caught. I never was caught, though. I got away with this many, many times over the years.

I would not do any sort of damage when I was in the school. I was even quite careful about putting things back exactly as I had found them if I picked anything up to examine it. I had a kind of satisfaction from getting away with this and from keeping my secret. As I recall, I never shared the information that I was doing this with anyone.

I would walk around from classroom to classroom and peer into the desk drawers. I wanted to know just what the teachers kept in those drawers. I don’t remember ever seeing anything very exciting. It was mostly pencils, erasers, and other small items that I found there. After about an hour, I would tire of this activity and head back to the study hall and the door to the slide. Down I would go and nobody was the wiser.

In my adult life, after discussing this with others, I found out that I was not the only one who was doing this. I guess it was a favorite pastime of a lot of the kids in the town. But just like me, they never shared their secret. I do remember that sometimes when I approached the fire escape that someone would already be playing there. I would hang around hoping they would leave but if they didn’t, I would go somewhere else to play. I guess they were just waiting for me to leave so they could do their own thing.

I don’t see these fire escapes on buildings anymore. If there are any, there are very few. I have fond memories of them and will never forget the fun I had on my own personal slide.