One dark night outside a small town in Minnesota , a fire started inside
the local chemical plant and in a blink of an eye it exploded into massive
flames. The alarm went out to all the fire departments for miles around.
When the volunteer fire fighters appeared on the scene, the chemical
company president rushed to the fire chief and said, "All our secret
formulas are in the vault in the center of the plant. They must be saved. I
will give $50,000 to the fire department that brings them out intact."

But the roaring flames held the firefighters off.

Soon more fire departments had to be called in as the situation became
desperate. As the firemen arrived, the president shouted out that the offer
was now $100,000 to the fire department who could bring out the company's
secret files.

From the distance, a lone siren was heard as another fire truck came
into sight. It was the nearby Norwegian rural township volunteer fire
company composed mainly of Norwegians over the age of 65. To everyone's
amazement, that little run-down fire engine roared right past all the newer
sleek engines that were parked outside the plant.

Without even slowing down it drove straight into the middle of the
inferno. Outside, the other firemen watched as the Norwegian old timers
jumped off right in the middle of the fire fought it back on all sides. It
was a performance and effort never seen before.

Within a short time, the Norske old timers had extinguished the fire and
had saved the secret formulas. The grateful chemical company president
announced that for such a superhuman feat he was upping the reward to
$200,000, and walked over to personally thank each of the brave fire
fighters.

The local TV news reporter rushed in to capture the event on film,
asking their chief, "What are you going to do with all that money?"

"Vell," said Ole Larsen, the 70-year-old fire chief, "Da first thing ve
gonna do is fix da brakes on dat focking truck!"

Jerry Clower circa 1982

Readers Digest Circa 1968

Who cares where it came from, it's still funny.

There are jokes that no matter how often you hear them they put a smile on you face, this is one of them.