Due to a recent historical discovery, the Green Bay Metro Fire Department's emblem is changing. The department's former emblem showed the "established" year of 1891. Recent historical research has determined community members established the earliest form of the Green Bay Fire Department in 1841, fire officials say. According to the research, in the early morning hours of Dec. 24, 1841, a block of N. Washington Street burned completely due to the absence of any organized firefighting efforts. A group of men came together to fight the fire themselves, crossing the frozen Fox River to the decommissioned Fort Howard garrison. The caretaker allowed the men to take the fort's hand-pumper fire engine to Green Bay. The men used the hand-pumper, which is currently on display at the Neville Public Museum, to stop the fire from spreading.