Recollections from generations past (Elmer A. Brittingham -8)

 

INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPT

Interviewer: Do you remember the fire? The Pocomoke fire?

Elmer: I was there.

Interviewer: You were there? What kind of damage…?

Elmer: It was in April the 19th, 1922. I had just caught the largest pike I had

 even seen in the river. Brought it home and hadn’t eaten my dinner and the

 fire whistle started to blow. I was off that day for some reason, I don’t know

 what it was, why I had been off. At least for Monday, I guess, I’m not sure. So

 then I went down…it was April 18 or 19, I don’t remember. Anyway, I went on

 down to see where the fire was. I went down to the store where I worked, and

 still worked part-time. My brother worked there, too, see. Mr. Vaughn had me

 go up to the roof and brush the cinders off. And for a while it got hot and he

 said, “You better come down.” And I did. I went up to where Paul Ewell had

 an office and we were taking the stuff out of there and  putting it across in

 the firehouse which was in back of where the Sears sales are now, from

 Willow Street side…So Mr, Ewell, I remember him saying…I picked up this big

 glass from the desk, and he said, “Well, don’t take it if you’re not going to

 take it right inside and put it down where it won’t get broke.”  Well, we carried

 all the stuff out of it and everything and that building burned before Mr.

 Ewell’s office burned. Where we carried it. It was one of them jumping fires.

Interviewer: So this was on the side of Market Street that the Post Office is on

 now? That burned?

Elmer: Not where the Post Office is now

Interviewer: Was it that side of the road that burned?

Elmer: Yeah, but not where the Post Office is. It didn’t burn back that far.

Interviewer: Oh, it didn’t come back that far? It was just the first couple

 blocks?

Elmer: It burned where the Coffman-Fisher building is, the old

 store, you know, across from Newberry’s.

Interviewer: OK.

Elmer: It burned all of Newberry’s. That was homes in there. Where the

 Newberry’s are. Right straight down and then went…jumped over to Front

 Street and burned around there. And down Market Street from Newberry’s all

 the way to the Peninsula building, which it didn’t do any damage to. Just 2

 blocks. It burned some of the buildings, just the tops of the buildings, on the

 left. And the bank across from Newberry’s, where the  Maryland National

 bank is, all that was pretty well burned. And the second block, only the tops

 were burned out.

Interviewer: OK, because we saw a picture of a bank and all that was left was

 the front of the bank. 

Elmer: Yeah, that’s right.

Interviewer: Which bank?

Elmer: The buildings on the left, across from Newberry’s, you know, on the

 left side

Interviewer: What was the name of that?

Elmer: There were a few fronts left….

Interviewer: What was the name of that bank?

Elmer: Maryland National. The old Citizen’s Bank, which is now called

 something else…Eastern Shore (?) that burned, too, and all stores in that

 block on the right….2 blocks on the right, but it only burned the corners

 because it was wooden buildings, some of them. It pretty well cleared that

 out, but it didn’t get where the (audio not clear) fish market was. It didn’t get

 that.

Interviewer: Was it a lot of panic or anything? People running around?

Elmer: Not panics, just…the wind was blowing a gale and the fireman couldn’t

 operate enough to drench it, see. They would get going and they’d go catch a

 fire over on the other side somewhere.

Interviewer: Was there just 1 group of firemen?

Elmer: Yeah, well, we had fireman from Salisbury, Princess Anne, Snow Hill…

yeah, they called all around. They always did that.

Continues next Saturday here at The Pocomoke Public Eye.