It has taken more than 15 years and about $600,000, but the sirens and bells once again will reverberate through historic Fire Station No. 3 sometime in the new year.

The stone building at the corner of Grinnell and Virginia streets has stood as an island protector since its construction in 1907, when the Key West Fire Department consisted of 12 paid men, 200 volunteers and horse-drawn steam engines.

As time and technology have marched on, the department has grown to include 70 paid firefighters using state-of-the-art fire detection and suppression equipment, according to department records. In fact, the Key West Fire Department is in line to receive a new, half-million-dollar fire engine in the coming months.

Times have changed, but retired firefighter Alex Vega has ensured that a significant piece of Key West history will not fall prey to the tumultuous real estate market and property development.

In the early 1990s, as plans for a new fire facility on North Roosevelt Boulevard were being finalized, city officials began talking about converting the old fire station into condominiums or using it as a garage for city vehicles.

That's when Vega stepped in.

"I knew it would be destroyed if guys began fixing trucks in there, or if it were sold for condos," said Vega, who began his firefighting career in Station No. 3 in the 1970s.

He then embarked on a preservation effort to save the old building and establish a museum dedicated to the history of firefighting in Key West.

Station No. 3 closed in 1998, the day before Hurricane Georges devastated much of the Lower Keys, said Vega, who has spent the past 11 years collecting artifacts from his profession and renovating the building.

Those efforts are nearly complete.

Visitors to the Firehouse No. 3 Museum will see a historic fire station that once housed horses ever at the ready to pull steam engines and water hoses. Vega also discovered one of two remaining coal pits in the nation.

"There's one other in Roanoke, Va.," he said. "But I haven't seen it yet."

The coal pit was used to extinguish smoldering coal from the steam engines.

"They kept those steam engines, which were steam pumps, really warm all the time, so they could fire them up quickly when they were needed," Monroe County Public Library historian Tom Hambright told The Citizen in 2007. "They would have had to tend to the pumps and rotate the coal, and put the smoldering coal someplace, to keep from starting a fire. This pit has been preserved nicely."

The museum also will feature the desk and coat of the infamous Fire Chief Joseph "Bum" Farto, who disappeared in 1976 after being caught brokering a cocaine deal.

The old fire bell that hung at the Key West City Cemetery for decades, and was rung to alert both firefighters and residents, also will be on prominent display at the new museum.

"I think the fire bell will be a big attraction, especially for the older residents who remember hearing it ring out curfew and fires," said Vega, who is also repairing a historic fire alarm system for demonstrations of how Station No. 3 sounded during times of emergency.

The museum has received money from state grants, private donations and the Old Island Restoration Foundation, but the need for funding continues. Vega estimates the project needs another $40,000.

"I'm really worried about being able to pay the electric bill each month," said Vega, who is considering installing solar panels. "We also have to pay insurance and continue installing a wheelchair lift. If not for the private donations, we would never have made it this far."

mbolen@keysnews.com