Remembering
By Joseph Celentano
TCMM Historical Research Committee
Fires in
February 2007
Over
the years,
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July
13, 1900:
The New Era. A meeting of the Old Town Hose Company was
held Monday night in the Town Hall and a number of new names added to the
membership list, beside the transaction of considerable business. According to law, a hose company cannot
consist of more than twenty-five members, and as this ruling will prevent many
from joining who have expressed a desire to do so, it is proposed to organize a
hook and ladder company, as an auxiliary, to the ranks of which sixty-five men
are eligible. A full list of all names
on the rolls of the companies will be published in these columns as soon as
full complements are secured.
The following will be the regular meeting
nights of the hose company: Regular meeting - first Monday in each month;
practice drill - every Monday; election of officers - first Monday in each
June.
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October
11, 1902: The
The following are principle property
losses: West Side Lumber Company,
$90,000, insurance $40,000; J.H. Carlton $6,000, insurance #3,500; Mrs. Carrie Randolph, $500, no
insurance; Fred Raymond $5,000,
insurance $1,000; John Summers, $500, no
insurance; Mrs. T. Bishop, $4,000,
Insurance $1,800; A. Wilming, $3,900, insurance
$1,100.
Much personal property, clothing, money
etc was destroyed, the value of which cannot be ascertained.
There were several narrow escapes, though
fortunately no fatalities. There is a
difference of opinion as to where the fire started. Many people say it broke through the roof of
the Raymond building, but Fred Raymond says the fire originated in the Peerless
Restaurant adjoining.
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February
4, 1916: The
The loss is estimated at $5,000, while
there was but $1,350 insurance on it.
The hall contained one of the finest dance floors in the mountains,
being of maple.
Last night a social dance was held in the
building, following the regular session of the dancing class, and at one
o’clock this morning the gathering broke up, leaving a fire blazing in the
stove.
It
is believed that, in some manner, live coals escaped from the stove to the
floor, smoldered and finally burst into flame.
The building was a mass of flame when the firemen arrived and, after a
few minutes of work, they realized that there was no use trying to save it.
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June
17, 1918:
C.A. Rozier reported in an
interview for the TCCRS that on June 17, 1918 there was a fire that burned the
whole town down. It started in the paint
shop at Pine and Chestnut opposite Bigelow’s Drugs. Ninety-five houses and stores were
destroyed. The breeze was from the west,
so the mill was not burned. The
Methodist, Episcopal and Catholic churches were saved, and the Old Town
Summersville) didn’t burn. Our house, at
Pine and Rozier, was the last one burned in this direction. Next door lived the constable, who was away
at the time. So our
father worked to save their house, while we moved what we could up the hill by
the high school. Men simply ran
out of the mill, though they weren’t supposed to leave without permission, to
help however they could. Many of the
fire hoses burned, making it harder to fight the fire...All we still have from
before the fire is mom’s trunk. All our
clothes and dolls burned. When the wind
changed and we were told to evacuate, Dad was on the roof, trying to water it
down. Our sister, told to fetch another
hose, ran and lost her shoes. But we all
just had to go. Afterwards, the Red
Cross gave us clothes.
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September
21, 1918: The firemen of
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April
26, 1919:
Fireman’s Hall opens May 17, 1919 just 11 months after it burned.
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December
12, 1944:
The
This morning at 5 o’clock the fireman’s
building, which in recent months has been used for a moving picture theater,
was destroyed by flames that also gutted two adjoining buildings. Loss is estimated at $35,000.
Gutted by fire were a one-story frame
building occupied by the Hi Lead Café and a two-story frame building housing a
hardware store on the ground floor and apartments on the second floor.
The fire is believed to have started in
the basement near the furnace of the Fireman’s Hall, but exact cause could not
be determined.
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October
16, 1936: taken from Marie Rozier’s personal diary.
“The big fire of 1936. The terrible day! No school.
Most too horrible to relate. Slept hardly an hour all
night. Wind fierce all
night. Fire whistle at 3:00 AM. Thought it was out this street. Got in car and followed out the
“At 7:30 am the fire whistle again and the
smoke pouring over the high school. The roar, smoke, wind, damage, fright. 10,000,000 feet of lumber went. The whole Sonora Yard. Wind strong enough to blow
pieces of lumber right off the piles and sailing into more fire. It was on both sides of the road and the
pavement was burning. We could not have
left town that way.
“Most everyone was packed and wondered
which way to go. Thankfully the wind was
from the east and the fire skirted and the town was spared. It went over by the Wilson Ranch and on down around the far side of Standard, sparing
that town and mill, but took all the bachelor cabins that were between Standard
and
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Circa
1970:
The
They are picturesque fire hose cart
houses, once used to alert the volunteer firemen and their neighbors with their
bells and then to provide hand-pulled hose carts for attachment to the nearest
hydrant.
One of the houses is on Carter Street in
an open area once know as the plaza or common, where the town was staged its
various celebrations through its various guises as Summersville, Carters and
finally Tuolumne. The area is now known
as
The other hose cart houses are in the
center of
The mid-street structure “directs” traffic
on each side of it. The local residents,
fond of their historical reminders, don’t mind the minor obstruction at
all. In fact, George Handy, a fireman here since 1907, notes that it once was
moved and then returned to its original location by public demand.
The first fire of note destroyed part of
the community in 1904 and another blaze razed more of it the following
year. A disastrous
fire in 1918 burned most of the business district of the present community. About all that was saved were the West Side
Lumber Company offices and the Methodist, Episcopal and Catholic Churches.
Neither has the fire department itself
been spared frequent ravaging by its enemy.
It has no less than four fire halls destroyed by flames.
The first three, each used as community
centers in addition to their anti-fire functions, burned in 1916, 1918 and
1944.
The firemen decided to discontinue their
non profit operation of a movie theater after the fourth blaze in 1960. This fire, however, did not impair the
department’s main duties because the trucks had been headquartered in a
concrete block structure on
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In other serious
fire news.....
November, 1901. The
The fire is supposed to have started in
the attic above the kitchen from a defective stovepipe. In less than 20 minutes after the fire was discovered,
the building was leveled to the ground.
The hose company did not bring out their
apparatus, as there are no water hydrants in that neighborhood. The contents, excepting three trunks and a
little clothing, were also destroyed.
The building was owned by Chris Schrorer, the proprietor of the Old Town Saloon, and his
loss is estimated to be at $1,200, with insurance to the amount of $900.
The furniture and other contents of the
house were owned by Pearl Hart. They had
been reported to have been insured for $1,000.
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In conclusion, the above articles in no
way mention all of the fires that occurred in Summersville, Carters and
The Turnback Inn, the two story store on
Bay Avenue, the Ensign Building, the Kimball Hotel, and of course, the WSLC
Mill in 1962. All gone
now.
There were individual family homes
destroyed by fire over the years, too numerous to mention here.
On a positive note, at Christmas time
after the big fire in 1918, Mrs. William
Thorson sent a Christmas present from Sears labeled for each member of a
family that had been burned out of their home.
Mrs. Thorson also arranged for Sycamore trees to be planted along the
sidewalks of every street that had burned.
Most of those Sycamore trees remain today. [RT 02-07]