Middlebury 1891 fire

 One of the things I like to do, beyond organizing my own photos, is searching for old photos on the Internet. (Like I need more photos to keep track of, I have over 57,000 I have organized with over 25,000 to review.) I have found some interesting internet sites and one event kind of stood out. This was the 1891 fire that happened in my hometown of Middlebury Vermont. Here is a postcard viewing the falls before the fire. You can see there was a wooden bridge over Otter Creek,

On my visit in 2010, I took a similar picture of the falls...now a stone bridge...

Looking for information on the fire, I found that the newspaper of the day can be found online and I found this...

Although this photo was labeled as 1891, I cannot tell if the bridge is wood or stone. Also, I think the cap on the Battel building on the right was added after they rebuilt. But there are people watching and after the photo I have included an excerpt from the newspaper...

This photo was also labeled 1891 and the spire on the Battelle building is seen here too. That is the Congregational Church on the left. I have included another newspaper clipping.

After the fire was done, the damage was extensive as seen in the next few photos. I have included a description of the area that was in the Middlebury Register.

That is Middlebury Inn in the center top.

The view across the falls of the burnt out buildings.

I took this photo in August of this year 2023. You can still see parts of the stone building from the fires, 130 years later. The building on the left is down to two stories, from the six in the previous photo.

I am not sure when this photo was taken but it appears after the fire and before the stone bridge. Another clipping from the Middlebury Register has been included about "The Golden Opportunity"

This picture was labeled as the first crossing of the new bridge. There are lots of stones so I guess the Golden Opportunity was taken...

I think this photo shows how the bridge was slightly damaged in the fire and had to be repaired. I think that is Park Street in the background.

Although the Provoncha clan was not living in Middlebury at this time, we were still mostly in the New York area of Ticonderoga, Schroon Lake and Lake George where there are still plenty of Provonchas. In the article from the newspaper Middlebury Register, there is a blurb about the chief engineer.

My Great Grandmother, mother to my Dad's mom, was Jennie Sargent. I am assuming that the Chief is a relative. As a kid, I went to many Sargent family reunions at Burnham Hall in Lincoln Vermont. BTW, there still waiting for the extra 500 feet of hose. Just Kidding!

Here are a few more pictures from 1890s Middlebury...

I hope you enjoyed the story.