Cloverdale Buildings Burned

Cloverdale Buildings Burned

Fire which started in a restaurant and lunch counter room in a hotel building in the business section of Cloverdale, Cal., recently burned four buildings in all, including the Humbert and the Manahan buildings. Three lives weer lost in the Cloverdale hotel and one fireman was slightly injured. The cause of the fire was the explosion of four gasoline stoves in the lunch counter room. In lighting one stove it exploded, setting off he others. One woman sleeping directly over the location of the stoves was burned to death; also one man in an adjoining room. Another man, with his clothing afire, jumped through a glass door and died a few hours later. Guests in the hotel escaped by windows. The alarm was given at 5:50 a. in., and Chief J. E. Helm and twenty-five firemen, and hose and ladder trucks at the fire with fifteen hundred feet of hose and six hydrant streams were thrown, the gravity water system providing sixty pounds pressure at the hydrants, ten of which were available. The buildings destroyed were one two-story brick, one twostory frame (the Cloverdale Hotel) and two one-story frame buildings. The burned area measured two hundred by one hundred and thirty feet. The frame buildings were constructed of redwood and the heat was so intense that it hampered the firemen and hose laying fifty feet away had to be kept wet so it would not burn. There was a wooden addition to the brick building. The value of the buildings were placed at $7,000 and the contents, consisting of the furnishings of tw'o saloons, one barber shop, Wells Fargo express office, a jewelry store and the Cloverdale Hotel, amounted to $35,000. The loss on both the structures and contents was total. When Chief Helm arrived the fire was leaping thirty feet above the roof of the hotel, so quickly had the wooden structure fed the flames. The fire burned for two hours and was stopped at the Mitchell building.

Fire which started in a restaurant and lunch counter room in a hotel building in the business section of Cloverdale, Cal., recently burned four buildings in all, including the Humbert and the Manahan buildings. Three lives weer lost in the Cloverdale hotel and one fireman was slightly injured. The cause of the fire was the explosion of four gasoline stoves in the lunch counter room. In lighting one stove it exploded, setting off he others. One woman sleeping directly over the location of the stoves was burned to death; also one man in an adjoining room. Another man, with his clothing afire, jumped through a glass door and died a few hours later. Guests in the hotel escaped by windows. The alarm was given at 5:50 a. in., and Chief J. E. Helm and twenty-five firemen, and hose and ladder trucks at the fire with fifteen hundred feet of hose and six hydrant streams were thrown, the gravity water system providing sixty pounds pressure at the hydrants, ten of which were available. The buildings destroyed were one two-story brick, one twostory frame (the Cloverdale Hotel) and two one-story frame buildings. The burned area measured two hundred by one hundred and thirty feet. The frame buildings were constructed of redwood and the heat was so intense that it hampered the firemen and hose laying fifty feet away had to be kept wet so it would not burn. There was a wooden addition to the brick building. The value of the buildings were placed at $7,000 and the contents, consisting of the furnishings of tw'o saloons, one barber shop, Wells Fargo express office, a jewelry store and the Cloverdale Hotel, amounted to $35,000. The loss on both the structures and contents was total. When Chief Helm arrived the fire was leaping thirty feet above the roof of the hotel, so quickly had the wooden structure fed the flames. The fire burned for two hours and was stopped at the Mitchell building.