Fire at the C.B. Coles Lumber Yard
This page and the other pages in this series are the successors to the series of web-pages about the Camden Fire Department called Camden Fire Department: The Fires of the Summer of 2011. On this and other pages in the series you will find pictures and information regarding different events and aspects of the fire service in Camden, New Jersey.
On the very hot day of July 10, 1933, yet another near conflagration occurred at the C.B. Coles & Sons lumberyard on Kaighn’s Point at the Delaware River. Five alarms from Box 31 were transmitted for a rapidly spreading fire involving an entire block bounded by Front Street, South Second Street, Kaighn Avenue and Mechanic Street. Before the blaze could be controlled, the lumberyard, a warehouse, a row of homes, a stable, a garage, and two colonial houses on Front Street were destroyed. Two firefighters were injured and twenty-three persons were left homeless. Damage exceeded $300,000.
As with the web page covering other Camden Fire Department events, if you can identify anyone that I’ve missed, please comment at the bottom of the page.
December 5, 2011
Camden Courier-Post — July 11, 1933
C.B. Coles & Sons Lumber Co. — Kaighn’s Point — Knight Street — Front Street — Mechanic Street — Kaighn Avenue — South Second Street — Margaret Dolson — Robert Dolson
Engine Company 8 — George Tucker — Charles Voll
Dr. Arthur L. Stone — Mrs. Marion Richards
Henry C. Coles — John Bircher — John H. Lennox — James H. Long — Harry Hertline — Joseph Novack — E.H. Stewart
Camden Clown Club — James Shay — Alice Williams — Alice Shay — William Shay — Stanley Berthelot — Henry Small — James Rice — William Haines — Anna Parker — Mary Numbers
Engine Company 2 — Engine Company 7 — William Hopkins — Felix Bendzyn — Dennis Block — C.E. Wells — Howe Street — Cedar Street
Clarence Madden — John Mulligan — George Garner — John H. Lennox — Engine Company 4 — Engine Company 5
Mrs. Mary Numbers — Mrs. Anna Parker — C.B. Coles & Sons Company — Front Street — Mechanic Street — E.H. Stewart — Joseph C. Maull — Dr. W.S. Thompson — Rachel Maull — William Champion — Ebenzer Toole — Harry Chambers
July 11, 1933
$250,000 Fire at Camden, N.J.
Huntingdon, Pennsylvania Daily News —
CAMDEN, N.J., July 11 — Damage was estimated at more than $250,000 today after a survey of the ruins of a lumber yard, two factory-buildings, and 13 houses, razed by a fire, which demolished an entire city block late yesterday.
Two firemen, William Hopkins and Felix Bendzyn, were in critical conditions in Cooper hospital of injuries they suffered when they fell from a burning building. Hopkins sustained a broken spine, while Block received several fractures and internal injuries.
Twenty persons were made homeless by the blaze, which started in the back yard of a private dwelling, and fanned by a strong wind from the Delaware river, swept across the C.B. Coles & Sons lumber yard.