Fire devastates Hillview in 1922

By Editor | July 13, 2022 |

By Carmen Ensinger

Barbara Donovan’s mother, Helen Orton, was a local historian who loved saving the history of Greene County. She made scrapbooks of every major event in the county and passed them onto her daughter, who is now sharing them on social media. Hillview is merely a shadow of what it once was, but this fire almost wiped it 100 years ago. The fact that it mentions the names of businesses and individuals will hopefully serve to keep the memories alive for another 100 years.

Destructive fire wipes out elevator and south side at Hillview

Feb. 11, 1922

The largest and most destructive fire Hillview has ever had occurred last Saturday morning about noon, when the V.C. Elmore Grain Elevator and eight other buildings on the south side of the railroad tracks burned.

The fire originated in the elevator and was discovered by Bob Hunnicutt who was hauling cobs and waiting for his wagon to fill. Burning cobs ran down the chute from the elevator and fell into the wagon. He gave the alarm. The elevator was running full blast. Corn had been coming from the country all morning.

Manager H.M. Battershell was in the office settling up with Mr. Hititz. Lloyd Patterson was weighing and dumping corn and Bill Jones was feeding corn to the belts which carried it to the sheller, and elevated it to the tower where it was screened, the shelled corn running into the bins, and the cobs down a longer chute to a brick and tile cob burner built a required distance from the elevator. The machinery was run by electric dynamos.

A number of men rushed to the top floor where the fire seemed to be confined to the inside of the cob chute. There was dense smoke but no blaze. An attempt was made to tear down the chute from the inside and the out. A barrel of liquid chemical kept for such emergency and water was carried up and thrown on. But the flames burst out on the east side and ran up to the roof.

The men came down the stairway, which was also on the east side. No further effort was made to save the building as the fire was about 75 feet from the ground and burning furiously. There was no way to get to it.

The books were taken from the office and some sack grain belong to Albert McClay were removed.

A crowd had gathered to watch the spectacular scene. The large oak building burned like pine. It would have been useless to try and protect the buildings on the south, across a narrow street. There was only time to get out part of their contests before they were burning.

They comprised a three-room house belonging to Irving Wetzel and occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Walt Olmstead (insurance is $300 on the furniture); four adjoining tenement houses, some vacant, other occupied by Crit Kessinger and son, Curtis, telegraph operator, Maurice Allen, shoe cobbler, and Irvin Blett, section hand, and family.

The first building was owned by George Terhune and was not insured. J.M. Hurst, of Jacksonville, owned the next three and carried $1,000 in insurance. These buildings were originally a store, barber shop, bowling alley with four rooms upstairs and a blacksmith shop.

A small building, formerly the post office and Bell Telephone Office, owned by E.N. Ford, was not insured. Mayo Ford’s household goods were stored there, and as they were packed, most of them were carried out, though the stove and several other pieces were left. Things burned so rapidly it was like so much dry kindling.

Some thought Crosby’s Produce House with the four-room apartment occupied by barber W.A. Ballard and family could be saved and tubs and buckets of water were brought from the creek to the roof; but the flames reached across from the elevator and enveloped the building.

Those who were still on the roof kicked in an upstairs window and went down the back stairs. Mr. Crosby didn’t lose much. Men waded the creek, carrying coops of chickens. Some potatoes were there, belonging to C.R. Angle and were taken to the basement. Ballard’s saved more than half of their furniture. Some of their clothes and a rocking chair burned after they had been taken across the creek.

The building was owned by C.R. Angle and was occupied by Angle and Martin Dry Goods and Grocery Stores for a number of years. It’s insurance was $1,800. Loss was about $4,000. Bill Jones’ furniture was carried across the railroad and was considerably damaged by breakage.

The White Hall Fire Department had been called upon and a truck load of men and apparatus arrived in time to put out a small poultry house back of Crosby’s store.

Oscar Pence’s residence across the creek caught fire and their belongings were carried out but the fire was easily extinguished.

The old white elevator owned by A.L. McClay was already being torn down, as it had been condemned some time ago. Only last week the roof of it was set on fire by a spark from a train. Quick work with picks, axes and buckets of water kept it from burning then.

It was next to the burning elevator on the west, but so much of it had been removed, it did not catch, neither did the new McClay warehouse, nor the Community Elevator, which, together with Bill Jones’ residence, and the coal sheds, are the only buildings left between the railroad and Hurricane Creek.

It is not likely that the burned buildings will be replaced (excepting the elevator) as the location is not a desirable one since the business section moved “uptown”. It is frequently overflowed by Hurricane Creek.

The fire hazard must be great. At other times, Wells’ and Ford’s store, the Schutz Elevator and the Adams’ Building burned on that same strip. The Elmore Elevator was the largest of eight elevators owned by V.C. Elmore of Ashland. The others are at Nebo, Pleasant Hill, Eldred, Roodhouse, Barrow, Manchester and St. Claire. One burned at Drake two years ago.

It was a pity to see such a valuable building and 6,000 bushels of corn burn and several hundred bushels of wheat burn, even though the loss was covered by insurance. Mr. Elmore’s loss by the destruction of the elevator and grain was, of course, the heaviest by far, and will run in the neighborhood of $25,000. He will rebuild at once, as the elevator at this point handles more grain than any other one of those operated by him.

Mr. Elmore, with a Chicago contractor, and his Roodhouse manager, R.A. Mansfield, were in Hillview today looking over the situation.