House Fire

I took this photo when I went home for Christmas in 2008. My parents, sisters, and I moved into this house in February, 1980 when I was 11 years old. It was so cold when we moved in that the toilets were frozen. Many changes were made over the nearly 31 years my family lived here. This is almost certainly how the house looked on December 14, 2010, before the fire. To our great fortune, no one was home that day.

Probably the fall of 1980 or 1981. The house was originally blue (you can see the blue peak where we couldn't reach with our ladder). There's an entry door next to the bay window on the right. There's no dormer. The corner of the house that later became the front porch was my bedroom at the time.

Uncle Hank and others spent several weeks with us in the 1980s to substantially upgrade, expand, and remodel the house. At times it was a big, working family reunion. This addition will become the master bedroom with closets in the eaves.

Rear view, with a rear door that led to the master bedroom. I guess the peak remained blue until the siding was replaced.

The dormer taking shape.

This will become the black and white bathroom.

This staircase was salvaged from another house in Cloverdale; it was the only thing still standing. I always liked this very simple shelf with each kid's senior photo.

The staircase installation. The doorway under the stairs (with the sliding chain (!)) leads to the basement.

A more wintry December visit, 2002.

Nighttime, December, 2008.

December, 2003. Decembers in Indiana are unpredictable, which made white Christmases somewhat special as a kid.

The day after the fire, December 15, 2010. This shot taken for the Banner Graphic newspaper in Greencastle, Indiana (no photo credit was given). The story that accompanies the photo is here.

This photo was taken by Rachel. This is the front porch with a remarkably unscathed swing. The unmelted plastic gutters suggest that this corner never got very hot. Likely the wall damage visible here was firefighters searching for people inside.

The remaining photos were taken by Brian. The garage appears to have suffered only scorching and melting.

We used to be afraid that the Sassafras tree (leftmost of the 3 big trees behind the house) would fall on the house.

I recognize Dad's exercise bike.

The kitchen. That's the front end of the Garland gas stove and the back end of the Copper Clad wood stove. Here's a shot of the kitchen from 2008.

Office.

Office, looking towards the kitchen.

Some paper survived: the one in the middle says "...lighten our load".

The shower/tub from the black and white bathroom. "Black and white" referred to the floor and wallpaper...the shower unit was white.

The table in the breakfast nook.

Looking up from the lower bathroom.

I recognize Mom's cookware, including a four-loaf bread pan.

Straight ahead was where the new stairs were located. Under the stairs was a pantry, and the entry to the pantry was a large confessional door. If the door was still standing it would be dead center in this photo.

The upstairs had 3 bedrooms, full bath, and a hallway that connected everything. The hallway was a library with one wall entirely filled with books.

The living room. There was a 50-inch TV in here.

The Copper Clad stove, with face-down bread warmers. To the right is what's left of the refrigerator. In between is the chest freezer. Here's a shot of the stove and fridge in 2007.

Closeup of the gas stove (you can see the oven racks at lower left). At center right is the Bunn coffeemaker. Here's a shot of these items from 2007.

This was a thermometer that hung on the garage for years. This tells me just how hot the fire was. This is what it looked like before being melted.