Firefighters Save Lumber Yard from Train Sparks
A rapid response prevents a major conflagration after engine sparks ignite a pile of posts.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Prompt and efficient service on the part of the fire department last Monday afternoon prevented a damaging conflagration at the yards of the Hudnall Lumber company. Fire, which started in a pile of posts, spread rapidly to an adjoining cement and plaster shed and the entire roof was enveloped in flames by the time the department arrived. Three streams of water were soon playing on the fire which was extinguished with a loss of about $400 to the company. The principal damage was to the cement from water. It is thought that the fire originated from engine sparks from a passing N.P. train.
“Three streams of water were soon playing on the fire which was extinguished with a loss of about $400 to the company.”
Railroad-ignited fires were a common hazard in early 20th-century Washington, frequently leading to litigation between industrial outfits and the railroad companies. Today, the focus has shifted to wildfire prevention in these same corridors as the region faces more frequent, extreme dry seasons.
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