Willmar tribune., 1904-07-27
Big PROPERTY LOSS

e~s Nv 6OOO
Early Morning BIazes Result in
Destruction Of Over $4,000
Worth Of Property.
Two fires in this city, involving q
total loss of some oyer Sl2, 900, oc-
CURED early last Thursday morning.
The fret was the destruction by the
6re fiend of the barn on Benson ave.
nue. belonging to Mrs. Wesley Burr
and the second, which closely followed
it, was the burning Of the large imple.
ment house of G. A. Erickson, located
on Third street and Benson avenue.
The alarm for the former was turned
in at l:50 and for the latter at 5:l5.
Both fires are supposed to have been
Of incendiary origin.
The Mrs. Burr property, which is
located between Sixth and Seventh
streets, is a small frame structure and
the loss is not heavy. 1t was fully
covered by insurance.
The fire originated in the hay loft,
which contained only small quantity
of hay at the time. The prompt &C.
tion of the fire department prevented
= total destruction of the building,
only the upper half suffering from the
flames. A horse and two head of
cattle belonging to the Willmar Pro.
vision Company were rescued by Night
Policeman Stephens, who first gave
the alarm.
This fire was attended with an acci-
dent to one of the fremen, which for
tunately did not result seriously, al
though very painful for time. The
victim was Carl Freeberg. Mr.. Free
berg and Emanuel Christensen were
engaged as nozzlemen, and in hand
ling the hose in the attempt to extin-
guish the flames it was accidentally
turned on Mr.. Freeberg. He received
the full force of the water in his right
eye, with the result that the eyelid was
turned in and the organ of sight so
badly infiamed that it was necessary
to consult physician. Several blood
vessels were bursted. and the victim
was obliged to take an enforced lay
off in order to nurse the injured men,
ber.
The big Gre of the morning was the
burning of the G. A. Erickson farm
implement house, to which the atten
tion of the 6remen was again called
after they had sought repose in peace
full slumber. This proved to be q
most destructive blaze, as the fire had
gained such hesdway before the de-
partment arrived that it was only by
the hardest kind of work that anything
could be rescued. The structure was
q frame building with corrugated steel
roofing and sides of steel sheeting.
This kind of covering made it difficult
for the firemen to do effective work
with the streams of water and it was
only through the small windows and
doors that the lines of hose could be
turned on to any advantage. The ad-
jacent buildings, however, were pre-
vented from becoming oyerheated and
the firemen did good work in hinder
ing further destruction. The contents
OF the building being of highly infam-
mable material, made it q very stub
born blaze and the work of destruc-
ton was rapid. Besides q large
amount of machinery there were about
four tons of baled hay stored in the
building and the day before 1000
pounds OF bindery twine had been re-
ceived. A tank containing about ten
gallons of gasoline was located in the
southeast corner of the building, but
this was removed in time to prevent
an explosion through the heroic ef-
forts of Firemen John Lundquist and
Hans Englestad, who succeeded in cut
ting an aperture in the wall to allow
of it's removal. The large l2-horse
power gasoline engine was badly dam
aged, while the smaller one was saved
The larger part Of the building was
used for . repository for farm imple
ments and the entire stock of binders
mowers, wagons, buggies, etc., was
totally destroyed. Mr.. Erickson car
ried a large stock at this season o.
the year and the loss is q heavy one
The rear part OF the building was used
for feed mill purposes and in the feee
mill business Mr.. Erickson was asso
ciated with his nephew, Arnold Erick
son, the firm Eame being Erickson &
Co. Luckily they had shipped Gu
about IL tons of hay couple of days
before the fire. All the feed stuffs OF
hand were destroyed.
Messrs. Erickson inform US that ,
carload of machine oil had been ex
pected and was due here before tn
fire. Had this been placed in tn
warehouse there would have been IA
more serious consequences, a. it woult
have been sure to explode with fright
full results.
The Office was located in the north
west corner and in this room ther
was 4 loss of about $3.50 on :severa
valuable papers, including notes
which had not been stored in tho safe
% we'll % several more or less valu
ahle articles keDt about the office