Arnot, Pennsylvania Fire
May
2, 1884
Williamsport, PA., May 3.-- The latest
reports here show the forest fires at various
places have been extensive, and very
destructive. ... Seventeen houses were burned in
Arnot, entailing an additional loss of $15,000.
Two million feet of lumber also burned.
Evening Observer, Dunkirk, NY, 5 May 1884
Arnot is built on the outskirts of an immense
tract of timber-land belonging to the Blossburg
Coal company, and it is estimated that 25,000
acres of the Company's timber were burned over.
In the immediate vicinity of Arnot workmen were
employed for several days in fighting the fires
which encroached upon the town. The woods
hug the place close on every side, and on Friday
when the heavy southwest wind drove the volume
of smoke and cinders across the clearing it was
thought that the village was doomed to
destruction at once. A house near what is
known as North drift was the first to take fire.
The steam fire engine with which the town is
provided was brought into action but
proved of little service in the fierce gale and
extreme heat. Seventeen houses, occupied
by twenty-two families, were burned and the
occupants saved little besides the clothing on
their backs. Their losses will amount to
$250 or $300 for each family, while the loss of
the buildings to the Company will approximate
$6,000. The plane was also burned,
entailing a loss of about $8,000. A number
of families went to Blossburg, where the kind
hearted citizens cared for them. A
dispatch was sent to Elmira calling for help,
and a steamer and a detachment of firemen were
sent by special train to aid in subduing the
fires at Arnot. Towards the night the wind
subsided and all danger was past.
Three miles below Arnot is a switch where
hemlock bark is loaded upon the cars. Here
over two million feet of hemlock and pine logs
were destroyed, besides six dwelling houses and
a quantity of bark. This amounts to a loss
of $10,000 to the Blossburg Coal Company.
There was no insurance upon any of their
property. At Landrus the saw-mill, the
largest one in the county, and ten million feet
of logs, and sawed lumber were saved by the
energetic efforts of workmen, although the fires
were burning all about and extending over the
wooded hills of Morris township.
..... Chief Engineer R. H. Walker, of the
Elmira Fire Department, was in the borough, and
he went to Antrim on the special train and then
drove across to join his men at Arnot. He
said the fires were burning on every hand, and
many times he was forced to wrap his coat about
his face and whip his horse into a run as he
dashed though the burning brush. He
reported numerous houses and barns along the
road in ruins.
The Wellsboro Agitator, Wellsboro, PA, 6 May 1884
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