1908 - FIRE LOSS OF $400,000 Blaze at Berlin, N. H., Wipes Out Eight Business Buildings

Berlin, N. H., Feb. 5. - With the thermometer at 20 degrees below zero, eight buildings in the heart of the business district of this city were destroyed last night, causing a loss roughly estimated at about $400,000. The fire was not declared under control until it had practically burned itself out after burning for five hours.

The blaze started in the four-story brick Green block, the largest structure of its kind in the city. The Berlin fire department was utterly unable to cope with the conflagration. The one steamer of the department broke down at the very outset of the fire, and until help came from Portland and Lewiston Me., the only streams played upon the fast increasing conflagration were two feeble hydrant streams that dribbled on the fire at a distance of fifty feet with force not sufficient to break a pane of glass. Some sick tenants in the Green block had narrow escapes from their homes.

The telephone exchange was burned out during the progress of the fire, the operators sticking to their posts until after the flames had attacked their structure. The blaze started in some excelsior in the basement of the E. A. Burbank company, furniture dealers. The fire was bounded on the north by the Gerrish block and on the south by the Sutton block.