Address:
Old Address: 54 Church Street
Other names: Salkowitz Cottage DIS (1911), Tops Supermarket (2001)
Year built: Before 1908 (Sanborn maps)
Other information:
Adirondack Daily Enterprise, December 22, 1975
Houses burn, cold hampers S.L. firemen
By PHIL GALLOS
SARANAC LAKE - A rash of fires plagued the local fire department during the last and coldest weekend of autumn. Two buildings, 54 Church St. and a camp building on Upper Saranac Lake, were destroyed.
With the temperature hovering around minus eight degrees Fahrenheit, the volunteers responded to at call to 54 Church St. at 11:20 a.m. Friday. A man hired by Earl Haselton, owner of the grey apartment house at the intersection of Church and River streets, had been thawing water pipes in an addition at the rear of the structure. The man had been using a torch which, a fire department spokesman said, apparently started the fire which smouldered in a wall and was not immediately discovered.
By the time the call came in at the firehouse and the firefighters arrived at the scene, the fire had moved up inside the wall and into the roof, and it took considerable time and effort to locate. As the fire spread, more men and equipment were called until there were finally 26 men on the scene with a pumper, a ladder truck, and a snorkle. A total of 1,900 feet of hose and eight ladders were used in combating the fire. Freezing water was a hazard, and two firefighters Douglas Duquette and Bruce McNamara fell from an ice coated ladder but were back on the job within ten minutes. Several others had to be treated at the scene for smoke inhalation.
The men finally secured at the firehouse at 6:55 p m. The rear section of the apartment house as well as a garage and its contents of a Volkswagen and two snowmobiles was totally destroyed and there was heavy smoke and water damage throughout the rest of the structure.
