On Wednesday night the local area had a spree of suspicious fires that broke out in an 8 mile radius of one another, and were all within a few hours of each other as well. There were four total all but one caused significant structural damage. Including one business Garver's Flea Market in Strasburg which was a total loss.The other businesses were in Brewster one was an old grocery store, and the other an old pizza shop, both of which have been closed for a little over a year. The fourth one that really gets my stomach churning was a church in Beach City.
This video is from the fire in Strasburg. The aerial on the right in the begining is the ladder truck from our fire department. Unfortunately I was working in Steubenville on this night.
This is the fire in Brewster at the grocery store. After the Fire Marshal's office came in and investigated of course they declared them arson. Here is the timeline of how the night unfolded:
10-13-10 2309 hrs. Fire reported at Garver's Flea Market in Strasburg
10-14-10 0040 hrs Fire reported at First Lutheran Church in Beach City
10-14-10 0053 hrs Fire reported at the former Jer's Pizza in Brewster
10-14-10 0100 hrs Fire reported at former JB's convenience store in Brewtser
Now judging by the timeline in my opinion this individual or individuals that started these fires had to have hung out near the Strasburg fire just waiting, and watching grinning from ear to ear watching their work. And once they realized that almost the entire Tuscarawas County fire service and part of Stark Counties departments were all on hand, they went to work wreaking havoc and testing our resources. But I hope much to their dismay we disappointed them. See one thing the fire service is great at is pulling together when the going gets tough, And I hope they saw how well we can function in situations like this. The greatest part about this service is we are brothers and sisters. Not just in our individual departments, but in the fire service as a collective unit. And when the cry for help comes out we will be there and we will prevail.
I hope this person or persons involved can have some feelings of remorse, but I know that as usual they probably have no guilty feelings. None about destroying the lively hood of not only the people who own the flea market, but all those individual vendors who had stands set up in the building. According to reports I have heard, there were numerous collectible items inside including historical artifacts, and pictures from the buildings history. Which they will never be able to replace. Also the building was on the historical registry for buildings. That building which was so selfishly destroyed was a piece of history for the village of Strasburg. Then to move down the road and attempt to burn down a church, that shows your morals in this life are way out of balance. I don't care what your religious views are, you don't set a church on fire. A church is not just about a Sunday service, its about family. It's a place where people go no matter what their walk of life to become one family in God. A church is not just a building it is the house of the Lord. I don't care if you agree with that or not in my beliefs that is exactly what it is. And to attempt to burn it down just shows you have no respect for religion.
If anybody has any information I urge you to please contact the Fire Marshal's office at 1-800-589-2728
Links to newspaper stories:
New Philadelphia Times Reporter
Massillon Independent
Canton Repository
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