Fire Sweeps 3 Buildings in Warsaw

$50,000 Blaze Laid to Exploding Film  

Warsaw, Ky., Nov. 27 (Monday) (AP) – Fire, apparently started by an exploding film reel in a movie house, swept through the three buildings of a business block here last night and early today, causing damage tentatively estimated at between $40,000 and $50,000.

The patrons of the movie house escaped safely and no one was hurt during the three-hour fight to bring the blaze under control.  Fire companies from the Covington (thirty miles northeast of here), Carrollton, and Ghent were called. Sheriff Earl Spencer, giving the damage estimate, said the fire apparently was brought under control about 1 a.m.

The blaze destroyed the telephone exchange and the village’s communication was cut off, although linemen expected top restore the circuits this morning.  The telephone operator at Carrollton said that persons who had just come from Warsaw reported that the film exploded about 10 p.m. during the last show.  The flames quickly spread through much of the building, which housed offices of the county agent and relief authorities.  A two-story building next door housing the Sheriff’s and County Judge’s office then went and a third building followed.  Warsaw, a village of 800 population, is the Gallatin County seat.

 Guests of the Brown hotel were driven out but firemen expected to save it with little damage.

From the Louisville Courier-Journal, November 27, 1939.