VENICE — Before coming to Venice in November 1926, “Old Betsy,” the city’s beloved 100-year old fire truck, had nearly been destroyed when the Great Miami Hurricane destroyed the dikes around Lake Okeechobee that year and flooded the city of Moore Haven, where as many as 300 people drowned.
That city survived that storm but its fire truck was sold to Venice in November that year. It arrived on Nov. 4, 1926 and served as the city’s first and only fire truck until 1949, when the World War II Army Air Base personnel left town…