The Waterbury Democrat., 1933-05-08

phone exchange, two of the city's four churches, four of its five rest aurants, and one of its two banks were among the structures ruined.
 Sun-up found 100 special police men and emergency detail of 25 state highway officers patrolling the shambles to guard against vandalism. Weary firefighters were still at their posts, quelled scat tered fires or watching smouldering ruins to prevent fresh outbreaks.
 Meanwhile authorities sought firebug whom they believed respon- sible for the conflagration. The in- cendiary theory developed from d report that a man was seen to fire a dwelling, about a mile from where the main fire started, and lied.
 "A check-up this morning indica- ted that no one was missing or seriously injured.
 Ellsworth, a thriving eastern Maine community of $500 popula- ton, the seat of Hancock county, was preparing to retire after typically quiet Sunday evening when two boys, Leonard Hill grove and Arthur Tilden, dashed down Main street, yelling "Fire!"'
 Royal J. Goodwin, the city's veteran fire chief, soon had Els worth's two pumps and hook-and- ladder on the scene. But the fire al- ready was raging furiously in the unused storehouse of Morang- Robinson Company.
 At 9:3O p. m., only half an hour after the blaze was discovered, it became apparent that only a mir acIe could save the center of the city. Swiftly the wind-lashed flames spread to Osgood's Pho- tOgraph Studio, Fortier's Sporting Goods store, a Chain Grocery store. Minutes later the entire lower Main street section was burning.
 Aid was rushed from Bangor, Brewer, Bar Harbor, Southwest Harbor. Northwest Harbor, Blue Hill, Busksport, Castine, and even such remote poitns as Old Town, 3T miles away, and Belfast, 50 miles away.
 Firemen, speeding over the roads, were delayed by thousands of motorists who, attracted by the cfimsoned skies, clogged the high ways as they converged on Els worth.
 3 Panicky residents, some of whom already had gone to bed, rushed from their homes and milled excit- edIy along the brilliantly-lighted streets in the fire area.
 With Main street in flames, the lire spread on an angle and swiftly enveloped business properties along the water, Franklin and Hancock streets.
 Realizing that with the fire talk ing this course their homes were doomed, hundreds of spectators hurried back to the residential sec- tion and began removing furniture and personal effects. The furniture was pilen in fields or strewn over lawns and sideyalks.
 Operators stuck to their posts at the telephone exchange, summon ing outside aid, until the intense heat drove them out. Less than an hour later the exchange, a four story wooden structure, was in ruins.
 Ellsworth was without telephone or electric light service for hours. After midnight an emergency tel ephone for newspaper men was rigged to telephone pole. Later 7 < lCAipO dly CAShdhS0 Wdo SSldD- lished in a dwelling which escaped { the flames.
 All communities within a radius < of 30 miles, including Bar Harbor, were thrown into darkness be- cause of the failure of power lines controlled in Ellsworth.
 The all-night battle, in which hundreds of firemen participated, was waged dramatically under blood-red skies and the lurid light of full moon. So bright was the