The Daily Alaska empire., 1946-01-21
S2OO,OOO FIRE OCCURS HERE SUNDAY p. M.
Tenants Aroused, Make Escape in Night Clothes
 Belongings Lost

Nineteen families are left home less and stripped of personal posses sions here by the worst Juneau fire disaster since the Goldstein Build ing was turned to blackened skele- ton on wintery February morning in 1889.
 Total loss is estimated at s200.000 resulting from flames that yesterday afternoon swept the Coliseum Thea tre and Apartment Building. leav- ing the structure almost entirely des- troyed and considered a complete i loss.
 Only mixed snow and rain con- bined with absence of strong wind enabled the full fire-fighting forces of the Channel area to confine the holocaust to the theatre-apartment building. At the height of the battle. i between 25 and 30 main hose lines were pumping tons of water onto the ] flames. Though futile as far as i quelling the main body of fire, the surrounding wall of water held the oonflagration within the doomed building.
 Two-AIarn Blaze
 The reaching flames, almost cer- tainly determined to have originated in the furnace room, already had an unyielding grasp on the building before the Juneau Volunteer Fire Department was summoned by 2-5 alarm sounded at 20 minutes past noon Sunday. The firemen were momentarily misdirected because the incorrect call had been sent out. Im- mediately after the fire truck ar lived at the scene, the second alarm was turned in to call out the full flame-fighter crew, at 12:30 o'clock.
 From then, through the afternoon and evening, the battle ragged; fire- men standing by through the night and into today. Yet this morning, three hose lines were being played on the charred debris. batting down persistent licks of flame springing up here and there throughout the re- mains of the building.
 Tenants Aroused
 First to become aware of the fire threat was Juneau Police Patrolman SoIon M. Dore, who turned in the alarm and reused the other tenants of the budding to their danger. All escaped without injury but with only pitiful few personal possessions. Several of the tenants fled the Guiding only in nightclothes.
 Patrolman Dore recounted that a gush of smoke suddenly poured int, his apartment through the wall un- der and around the kitchen sink. By the time he had turned in a call to the Fire Department and had run through the halls of the apartments to wake up the other dwellers, the fire had obtained such firm foot hold in his apartment that he was unable to return to save any of his belongings.
 Tenants Listed
 Among other tenants occupying the Coliseum Apartments, as listed by Agent Charles Tuckett, were: Cliff Daigler. Mrs Harold Saver, V. Mcdonnell, A. Humphrey. Betty Memeth, O. Wagner, P. w. Talking ton, Marie Ratcliff, Flossie Doolin, Eli Kay, Eugene Haveland, Peggy McIver, A. LaMont. N. A. McEach- ren. Sue M Kennedy and E. J. Harter.
 Dore's apartment was on the first floor above the theatre auditorium. situated almost directly above the furnace room and abutting the brick furnace flue up which the flames first coursed.
 1 First Flames Qucnched | Upon first arrival, firemen found the fire already swarming up the wall of the theatre foyer onto the balcony. The incline to the bal cony was burned through. They succeeded in quenching all flames in the foyer. balcony and furnace room; but by that time fire was eating it's way from end to end of the building in the dead space be- tween the auditorium roof and the first floor of the apartments above. Metal plating facing the theatre ceiling formed barricade above which the flames were able to work their will almost unassailable. Difficulties Adding to the difficulty of com- batting the blaze was an enclosed balcony corridor jutting out from the lower apartment floor along the entire north side of the building. It presented an outer rampant that had to be preached before the firemen