Few sounds in Oakdale carry the weight of memory quite like the old Fire Station 28 air horn, a relic from the city’s volunteer firefighting past that once marked emergencies — and later the hours of the day.

On Monday night, April 20, Assistant Fire Chief Andrew Hunter brought the matter before the Oakdale City Council with a blunt question beneath the nostalgia: Should the city keep sounding a horn that no longer serves any operational purpose for modern fire service?

The council answered yes, approving continued operation of the horn on a 5-0 vote.

In his staff report, Hunter traced the horn’s roots to the early 1900s, when it was installed to alert volunteer firefighters to emergencies. Before radio and modern station alerting systems, the horn was used to signal calls, sometimes with coded blasts indicating the location of a fire.

The report said the horn was also tied to a mechanical clock that sounded daily at 7 a.m., noon and 6 p.m., eventually becoming “a longstanding tradition and part of Oakdale’s identity.”

That historic role had long since faded. The original clock stopped working in the late 2000s and was replaced in 2009 with an electronic timing system. The horn itself was repaired and restored in 2016 after a period of inactivity.

But the city reported that programming the electronic timer had been unsuccessful, and the system continued to present maintenance issues.

Hunter laid out four options for council consideration: continue the current schedule of 7 a.m., noon and 6 p.m.; discontinue the horn entirely; reduce it to a more limited schedule, such as noon only; or provide alternative direction.

However, Hunter warned, “We’re going to continue to have mechanical failures with it,” adding that the horn could sound at the wrong time or, as had happened before, continue blaring “until it runs out of air.”

The staff report echoed that concern, stating the electronic timer had “proven difficult to program and maintain,” potentially requiring additional staff time or outside technical assistance.

It also said the ongoing cost of operating and maintaining the horn system was unknown, though part of the air compressor maintenance would continue regardless because the compressor is used for station functions such as inflating apparatus tires and operating pneumatic tools. Any future repairs specific to the horn system would have to come from existing maintenance budgets or return to the council in a future budget request.

Even so, Mayor Cherilyn Bairos made clear where she stood.

“So maybe, if fundraising is needed, maybe you can talk to somebody that will be willing to put a plaque up and say, ‘Hey, this is sponsored by person 123, XYZ that wants to continue this tradition,’” Bairos said. “For me, I am option one, 500 percent.”

In the end, the council chose to preserve a tradition that no longer summoned firefighters, but still resonated with many residents as a familiar sound of home.

Staff will investigate ways to modernize the electrical system to ensure the air horn’s continued operation.