BELLFLOWER — Visitors to the temporary Los Angeles County Fire Museum, 9834 Flora Vista St., can view free of charge some 25 antique fire engines and vehicles between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. the first Sunday of the month, according to Capt. Paul Schneider, president of the Los Angeles County Fire Museum Association.

On display are a number of horse-drawn or steam-powered engines, including one from 1905; a restored manually pulled pumper from the 1860s and a 1925 Stutz, the first fire engine to serve in Bellflower.

But by far the most popular exhibits are two engines and a rescue car from Squad 51, made famous in the NBC television show “Emergency,” which ran on NBC from 1972 to 1977, starring Randolph Mantooth and Kevin Tighe who portrayed paramedics Johnny Gage and Roy DeSoto in the series.

“People come from all over the world to see those vehicles,” said Schneider, 50, a member of the Los Angeles County Fire Department for 21 years, currently stationed with Engine Company 16 in South Los Angeles.

Capt. Joe Woyjecik is vice president of the association.

Schneider stressed that the private, nonprofit museum association is a separate entity from the county Fire Department, although most of the 3,000 association members are current or retired county firefighters.

The Bellflower site, a blue two-story building which formerly housed an auto repair business, is now owned by the city, which leases the building to the association for $200 a month, Schneider said.

He said that while other fire museums, including ones in Long Beach and Los Angeles, as well as the African-American Firefighter Museum in South Los Angeles, feature vehicles and artifacts from those departments, the Bellflower facility has a wider purpose.

“Our goal is to honor the firefighting service throughout the country, with emphasis on Los Angeles County’s contributions,” Schneider said.

Those contributions included the first paramedic unit, made famous by the nationally televised show and the practice of helicopter water drops on forest fires that began in the 1960s.

“The TV show helped spread the formation of paramedic units in fire departments throughout the nation and world,” said Schneider, who noted that background action scenes on the show were actually filmed footage of real firemen and paramedics in action.

County firefighters and paramedics did not get any pay for appearing on TV, with one exception. Mike Stocker, occasionally seen driving a fire engine on the show, was an actual on-duty county firefighter who happened to have a Screen Actors Guild card, Schneider said.

The late Jim Page, who joined the fire department in 1957 but was not part of the TV show, is credited with establishing the paramedic unit and helping to promote it with personal appearances nationwide after he retired. He also served as fire chief in Monterey Park for a time and oversaw a private emergency medical service operation, Schneider said.

The Bellflower City Council last year allowed the museum association to lease the Flora Vista site while preparing a financial business plan and raising funds for a permanent, larger building on vacant city property on Bellflower Boulevard, south of Flora Vista.

The business study, being done by a hired consultant, is almost completed. Fundraising for the $15 to $20 million building is expected to start this year, Schneider said.

Meanwhile, the temporary site is being put to good use, with 20 to 40 visitors the past couple of months under the Sunday program, plus up to 500 for special events, such as a graduation ceremony for 250 paramedics, an open house for members of the California Contract Cities Association and even an antique car show, he noted.

The permanent building is envisioned as a two-story facility large enough to display the existing 25 vehicles plus another 30 in storage in a South Gate warehouse. A restaurant and community meeting room also have been proposed.

In recent years, the association has been accumulating fire apparatus, most of it donated from collectors although the more rare pieces of equipment have been sought out and purchased, Schneider said.

Besides preserving fire equipment from the past, the association is looking to the future.

“We have been accumulating fire apparatus as it is retired from fire stations and have put them in storage,” Schneider said. “Right now they don’t look much different than existing firefighting equipment. But in 40 years they will be antiques.

“We are preserving current fire engines for the future,” he said.