Ironside uses a fourth-floor room (for living and office space) in the old San Francisco Hall of Justice building, which housed the city's police headquarters. He recruits the angst-filled black ex-con Mark Sanger to be his personal assistant after Sanger is brought in as a suspect who wanted to kill Ironside. Ironside acquires a specially equipped, former fleet-modified 1940 1½-ton Ford police patrol wagon. This is replaced in the episode titled "Poole's Paradise" after the van is destroyed by Sergeant Brown as part of a way to trick a corrupt sheriff. At the end of the episode the patrol wagon is replaced by a one-off fully custom modified 1969 1-ton Ford Econoline Window Van.