Franklin.Is.Hit.By.$150,000.Fire.1924.Simpson.NEWSFrom: KyArchives 
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Subject: Franklin.Is.Hit.By.$150,000.Fire.1924.Simpson.NEWS


Franklin Is Hit By $150,000 Fire January 28, 1924 
Simpson County KyArchives News 
Courier-Journal January 28, 1924 
The Courier Journal                   January 28, 1924  Section 1, Pg. 1, Col. 6 

FRANKLIN IS HIT BY $150,000 FIRE 
Part of Business District Is Wiped Out By Early 
Morning Blaze 



Special to The Courier Journal 
   Franklin, Ky., Jan 27. - A large part of the business district of Franklin 
was wiped out today by the most disastrous fire the city has known since the 
War Between the States.  Loss was estimated at $150,000 of which $87,000 was 
covered by insurance. 
   The blaze was discovered at 2:45 o’clock in the Keystone Drug Store on the 
public square.  It spread rapidly to the Keystone Hotel which it destroyed and 
was not checked until half the block was laid in ruin. 
   Several guests in the upper floors of the hotel, a three-story brick 
building, were forced to flee by the fire escape when the stairway burned.  W. 
R. Shelton and W. C. Wheless, operators of the hotel, fled the blazing 
buildings in night clothes. 
   Besides the hotel and drug store, buildings destroyed were the building 
owned by Mrs. E. J. Hobdy and Mrs. H. H. Knapp, the offices of Moore & Moore, 
attorneys; the offices of Dr. B. W. Neely and Dr. J. W. Hays; offices of LaRue, 
Angela & Vance, real estate dealers; the store of Colly Brothers; the H. 
Fainberg Dry Goods Store; the office of J. C. McLain; Jasper’s Grocery, E. R. 
Ray’s store, H. G. Guthrie’s restaurant, the office of the Postal Telegraph 
Company and the lines of the Kentucky Utilities Company. 
   By destroying the utility Company’s lines the fire cut off electric power 
for lights in the city. 


Submitted by: Walter Chisholm 
ezecho@aol.com 



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