Montour American. (Danville, Pa.) 1866-1920, 1904-08-25
FIRE CAUSES
MUCH DESTRUCTION
Continued from First Page. !

house also helped to protect that build
ing, although the porch at one time
was on fire and was burning rapidly
but was extinguished by w. g. Brown.
The Brown building, higher than the
rest, with its successive flights of
wooden stairs on the rear was in great
peril, but the entire building was kept
drenched with water, Mr.. Brown him
self playing on the lower stories with
a garden hose, and Mr.. Leister, who
occupies the fiat, with his family,
keeping the upper stories drenched by
means of larger hose attached in the
house.
BY TINS time a thousand people had
assembled at the fire. 1t was a moment
of great suspense. Immense volumes
of smoke raining fire brands down in
to Mill street poured over the roofs of
the Brown, the zimmerman and the
Pursel buildings. Houses on the east
side Of Mill street even were in danger
and several of these were kept dIench-
ed with water by their owners. All
this while only a slight wind was
blowing and no one could help but
picture the flightful results should the
wind increase or should the fire have
occurred during dry weather instead
of Just following rain, as on Satur-
day, when everything was damp.
Such was the state of affairs when
tho fremen began to play upon the
row of burning buildings. The efforts
of the fire fighters were watched with
the utmost anxiety by the many fsmi-
lies whose premises extended to the
very threshold of the burning build
ings As usual, however, the work of
the firemen was effective. Several
streams of water were soon playing
upon the fire and it was not long until
the great blaze which lit up the heaV-
ems began to subside. Each of the
barns was rooted with tin. which to
some extent may have interferod with
the best efforts of the firemen. But
the first thing done was to check the
spreading of the fire. It was impossi
bic to save either the zimmerman or
/ the Pursel barns; Sunday where
these had stood was to be seen only a
heap of blackened debris the building
on Mr. Woods property is about half
burned bur will be a total loss. New
/ Notwithstanding OH the east end and
a new roof for portion OF the large
carriage house belonging to 9. o.
! Mover, VIII restore that building as
good aS new.
/ Mr. zimmerman Saturday night stat
ed that H. has reason to believe that
/ the fire was the work OF an lncendlary.
/ He returned home from the farm early
i'm the evening; he stabbed the horse
( himself, fed him and closed the barn
/ and he is confident that everything
/ was right.
\ valuable COW, for which Mr.. Am
merman said he would not have taken
I fifty dollars, was burned with the
/ barn The horse rescued and taken out
. through the insurance Office had to be
+ killCd as its injuries were found to be
/ Of such a nature as TO preclude all
( hope of recovery. An old buggy was
/ pulled out of the barn partly burned,
/ but a good spring wagon and new
/ buggy, which were further in the
/ building, were consumed by the fire.
/ In addition to the large quantity of
/ hay some twenty bushels of oats and
other feed were burned
/ Mr. zimmerman had only small in
surance on his barn and his loss will
! be quito heavy The Pursel barn
/ itself was partially insured. as WAS al
So the barn on the Woods property
/ Livcryman Meyer carried no insur-
ancc.
/ Milton zimmerman and sister, Miss
Maggie along with some city visitors
were camping out over on the farm
aud had with them one of the horses
and the barouche, otherwise in all pro-
/ liability the two latter would have
| been burned also.