Memories Are All That Remain

Though not as internationally renowned as Hannibal's Mark Twain attractions, the building originally designed for the Bluff City

The fire that blazed through the night Thursday and continued to smolder Friday destroyed more than a building made of stones and wood. It took a place that practically breathed with the memories made there.

Pat Carter worked as an administrative assistant for Standard Printing on the first floor of the building from the early 1970s until the mid-1980s.

With a mixture of fondness and sadness, many Hannibal residents took note of Thursday's loss. Clayton Baldwin, now semi-retired, worked as the sales manager when the building housed Standard Printing and Bruce Hardwood Flooring and, like many, was sorry to see the building go.

"I was kind of saddened by the whole thing. I had a pretty nice office when I worked there and I spent a lot of time there," he said. "My kids would come in on the weekends when I was working. It was a great place for the kids to run around and play hide and seek. It was kind of a spooky old place on the weekends."

More than one generation of Carter's family also claimed the building as part of their past. Carter said her mother and aunt worked for Bluff City Shoes on the production line and she personally had many childhood memories.

"My mother, at one point, did gluing of shoe soles and she'd come home just covered with rubber cement," she said. "I know someone went off with a diamond in their shoe sole because she lost her wedding ring diamond once. We always said it was just because she wanted Dad to buy her another one."

The flames of Thursday's fire pulled at Carter's heart strings because of the family history buried in the rubble.

"Last night when I saw the flames it was like a part of my life just left. I had fond memories of working in that building and of the people that I worked with and everything," she said.

The age of the building and a myriad of other factors certainly aided in the heat, speed and intensity with which the fire burned, but Fire Chief Gene Dryden said the cause was determined to be an electrical short.

Reading from the state fire marshal's report, Dryden said, "the fire was determined to be accidental and caused by an electrical short."

Dryden said crews stopped working for a few hours Friday afternoon to allow for the investigation, but did spend approximately four hours on the scene throughout the day.

Dryden reported that, aside from watching for hot spots caused by tin covering plastic and other materials that were stored in the building, the fire department was finished at the scene. The last crews pulled out between 5 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. Friday.

The state fire marshal's office estimated the dollar amount of damage could be as high as $4 million.