Morning journal and courier., 1885-12-30
A s2,5OO FIRE.

The Box Factory Of William P. Dick
 erman Burned To The Ground And
 With 1t Thirty . Two Thousand
 Shocks, The Property of The Candee
 Rubber COmpany-Probably Incen-
 diary.
 About half-past o'clock last evening the
 watchman at the New Haven steam sawmill
 noticed fire in the rear part of William P.
 Dickerman's box shop on Chapel street near
 the railroad track below East street. The
 watchman sounded an alarm from box No.
 38. The fire was then raging fercely. The
 steamers arrived promptly. The building
 was soon one mass of flames and the sparks
 were flying high into the air and landing on
 the piles of lumber in the yard near by and
 on the roof of the sawmill, and
 this lumber had to be thoroughly soaked be- fore the fremen could turn their attention to
 the burning building. The crowd of nearly
 three thousand people which quickly gath cred somewhat hindered the fremen at first from deing good service, but after the hose had been turned in the direction of the crowd once twice they quickly scat tered and left the firemen to do
 their work Eight streams were played on to the fire, and it was confined to the one story basement wooden building 35x75 feet and an additional building about 25 feet square and to the small office in the front part of the building. In the building were about fifteen carloads of shocks, there being about two thousand shocks in 8 carload. These shocks were the property of the rub Der shop and were stored there by the Can dee Rubber company, MT. Dickerman mak- ing as many boxes for them a day as the company wanted to use. In the basement of kI,o l.,;1 ha1 haa1, {hn ohou made by the men at their work. These were put into the basement through a trap door. All this wood made good fuel for the fire and the fremen had all they could do to keep it confined to the building which was burned to the ground, and had the wind been blow ing, the surrounding buildings could no have escaped being burned. About ten o'clock the fire had nearly been extinguished when the pipes were uncoupled to allow a train to pass, this taking about ten minutes, in which time the fire again gained headway, and at one o'clock the fremen from two of the engine companies, with the ice hanging from their rubber coats, were l busy tearing down the remains of the build l ing and putting out what fire remained with l two streams of water. The fire was probably l the work of an incendiary, as it started in the | rear of the shop, and there was no light or fire in the building after 4 o'clock in the | afternoon, the men having stopped work at that time The loss on building, which was the property of MT. Dickerman, was about 1 $500; fully insured in the Cannon agency. The Rubber company's loss is about $2, 900 | on the shocks, they being stored there at the company's risk, but the loss is fully covered l by insurance in the Cannon agency. The 1 firemen were served during the evening with l hot coffee crackers and cheese by MT. Dick ! erman, who appreciated the good work done l by them in keeping the flames from spread ! ing. One of No. S's hosemen was njured by | the falling of 8 timber upon his head. He was sent to his home in a carriage. ! Neriden's New High School Dedicated
 The new High school $500, ,000 building at | Meriden was dedicated with appropriate OCT emonies yesterday afternoon. The exercises 1 consisted of history of the High school and | a description of the building by Rev. Dr. 1 Chapin and readings and singing by pupils | and alumni of the school. The principal | feature of the occasion was an address by | Senator O. H. Platt on the growth of educa- tion in Meriden and was valuable for it's sta tistical information and the sensible sugges- lions it contained.
 T. H. Warnock, of the Yale Law school | and Meriden High school alumnus, read a paper. Representative Davis presided dur ng the exercises, which were attended by l several hundred educators from all parts of | 5he State,