Houston's switch from a volunteer to a fully paid fire department stemmed from city growth and several devastating fires that left Houstonians feeling that their fire protection was no longer adequate.

Houston's population in the mid-1890s was nearing the 30,000 mark, making it the state's fourth largest city after Dallas, San Antonio and Galveston. But the deciding factor in the move to a paid fire department was a series of fires from the late 1880s to mid-1890s. The most serious of these occurred at the Saint Joseph Infirmary.

Around 2:30 a.m. on October 16, 1894, a fire broke out in a boarding house next to infirmary property. Boarders were seen jumping to safety from the windows as the fire spread to the infirmary buildings. Nuns, firemen, policemen and citizens struggled to evacuate the three facilities, moving 40 patients to safety. By daybreak, nine of the dozen buildings on the block were destroyed. Worst of all, two nuns had died in the fire and a third was critically burned.