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Gardiner Fire A Mystery
It was a few minutes after five o'clock on a warm Thursday afternoon. Ellen Nellie Clinton felt a warm breeze coming from the south as she walked along Main Street and up Christian hill on her way home from work as the bookkeeper at the GLF feedstore. Feedstore manager Nelson McElhenny and two of his men were still busy loading feed and cleaning up around the farmers' cooperative building.
The tiny village of Gardiner was a bustling rural hamlet at the intersection of the Farmer's Turnpike and the Wallkill Valley railroad. The area had originally been named Church Corners after landowner Samuel Church, but was renamed Gardiner when the hamlet grew up in the 1870's. The village provided services for area farmers, with the feedstore, sawmill, creamery, icehouse and blacksmith shop. The little town also had a busy railroad station, a well-known hotel, a funeral home, churches and stores.
The future looked promising for this little village. No one that day would have dreamed that Friday's newspapers would carry a headline "Gardiner Village Devastated By Fire"�. It was Thursday, May 21, 1925. Gardiner would never be the same.
It started as a wisp of smoke coming from the rear of the feedstore. Philip Donahue, who owned a farm in the hamlet, sent one of his boys outside to see what the people were shouting about. In a few seconds, someone began to hammer on the fire gong, and men rushed from their evening meals to haul the old hand-pumper out of the firehouse.
The wind fanned the fire, and it quickly spread across the railroad tracks to the icehouse and sawmill. By 7 p.m. the night sky was bright with an orange glow, and farmers for miles could see the signs of a disaster.
The fire had spread from the GLF feedstore to the sawmill, and to the icehouse, and then to the storage sheds, and to the undertaking house, then to the garage, and also to the small town hall on Milk Street. It blazed out-of-control for three hours, destroying the center of the tiny village and leaving scars which can still be seen today.
Volunteer firemen came from New Paltz, Walden and Highland with hand pumpers and new gas-driven fire engines. Men fought the fire with brooms and shovels. Residents of the village were evacuated from their homes as the fire quickly spread eastward. Youngsters were sent up on the roofs of buildings to watch for new outbreaks of smoke. For as far as a mile away, farmers were busy guarding their haybarns from the ash and cinders being carried by the wind.
The fire lasted for more than six hours. It was brought under control at about 10 o'clock that night, after more than a hundred firefighters had drained two nearby ponds and a small stream. Gardiner physician Homer Stephens treated volunteers for smoke inhalation, exhaustion and other minor injuries.
At daybreak, with volunteers from Gardiner and Walden still at the scene, residents saw the extent of the devastation. The entire business district of the town was now smoldering ruins. The village had nearly been destroyed by one of the worst fires in Ulster County history.
The fire had destroyed the Gardiner feedstore; the storehouse owned by Michael Lyons; William Ladue's storehouse on Milk Street; Frank Moran's undertaking house; the icehouse owned by T. J. Callahan; the garage owned by Wright and Libal on Main Street; the grocery store and ice cream parlor owned by George Currie; John Rosencrans' sawmill and gristmill; the tiny town hall on Milk Street, and two railroad cars which had been parked near the GLF building.
The flames had also claimed a portion of the Gardiner hotel and had severely damaged the home of Mame and Jennie Elting on Milk Street. There was minor damage to some other rooftops, but none of the houses along First Street had caught fire. Damage was later estimated at more than $ 150,000.
Within a few days, Gardiner residents announced plans to rebuild. The GLF feedstore was rebuilt. Wright and Libal used T. J. Callahan's garage to do repair work until their shop was rebuilt. George Currie's store and dwelling were rebuilt by carpenter Charles Wells and his son Floyd. The hotel was repaired, and the Elting house got a new roof and side wall. Other buildings, including the sawmill, would never be replaced. The fire took its toll on the economy of the village too, and once-thriving businesses would close or move elsewhere.
Volunteer firemen met less than a week after the fire to reorganize their small fire company and form a fire district. The town would vote in October, 1926, after much debate, to spend $ 6,250 for a new, 500 gallon gas-driven fire truck to replace the old hand-pumper. At a meeting eight days after the fire, Gardiner residents endorsed a letter to surrounding communities which read, in part, "in view of the late conflagration which visited our community, we the firemen and people of Gardiner do hereby express our hearty gratitude and appreciation of the services of the fire companies of New Paltz, Walden and Highland for their prompt response to our call of need, and for their untiring efficient labors in the face of danger and pain in controlling destruction in our little village."�
It was Friday, May 29, 1925. No one would ever be sure how the fire had started, or why it had diminished just before the water had run out.
By Michael Moran
Reprinted from the Citizen Herald, Walden, NY
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