Correct, it’s also the birth of insurance. People would pay a subscription style fee to the fire brigade so their house would be protected in case of a fire.
It’s something satirised in The Colour of Magic, the first Discworld novel.
There’d be fire markers on the outer walls to indicate which fire protection company covered that building and whichever firefighter turned up would bill that fire protection company who’d then bill the customer/customer’s insurance company.
Edit: typo, damn these supposedly opposable thumbs!
I’ve never heard of them in the modern day, but I know that’s how fire brigades started in the UK
Correct, it’s also the birth of insurance. People would pay a subscription style fee to the fire brigade so their house would be protected in case of a fire.
It’s something satirised in The Colour of Magic, the first Discworld novel.
Precisely.
There’d be fire markers on the outer walls to indicate which fire protection company covered that building and whichever firefighter turned up would bill that fire protection company who’d then bill the customer/customer’s insurance company.
Edit: typo, damn these supposedly opposable thumbs!
I think you meant fire maRkers
Interesting. I had heard privateers were the inventors of insurance. Perhaps what I read was inventors of health insurance.