Crippled Graduate Who Goes to All Fires in Motored Wheel-Chair an Expert on Combustion

No less a permanent fixture in Cambridge than Memorial Hall or the Lampoon's annual wheeze about Freshman advisers is David Dickinson '20, the big man with the broad brimmed hat, who for fifteen years has on fair days followed the fire engines in a red three-wheeled contraption that looks like a cross between a kiddie-car and a barber's chair.

Crippled by infantile paralysis many years ago, the former fire insurance expert now chases fires and photographs them with his Graflex as a hobby. This spring he plans to have a two-way police radio installed so that he can follow police calls.

Handy in Traffic

Dickinson's little vehicle was made specially in Dayton, Ohio, and is run by electricity. "It only goes about 17 miles an hour, but it seems a lot faster," he explained yesterday. "And it certainly is handy getting around in traffic."

He is an expert on fires and fire-fighting equipment in Boston and vicinity, and his file of pictures runs the gamut from the removal of a cat form a tree to general alarm blazes. He knows just what equipment each department possesses, and is particularly partial to old-time, horse-drawn steamer units.