Fire at St. Mary’s School

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On the morning of January 30, 1953, there was a disastrous fire at St. Mary’s School in Willimantic, CT. The fire, which originated in the boiler room, raged for five hours and destroyed the building. I found these going through some of the old family photos, threw them on the scanner and cleaned them up. I think that everyone in our town has one or two of these photos of the fire lying around in a box or an album. The tight-knit community banded together, raised money, and the new school was dedicated in 1955. There’s one more photo behind the cut. 

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4 Responses to Fire at St. Mary’s School

  1. Old NFO says:

    Things like that were handled in the community, not going crying to .gov… sigh…

  2. Tina says:

    The fire was on a Friday morning, they began fundraising THAT night. Also interesting was that a public school made room to accommodate to students until a new school could be built. Can you imagine that happening now?

  3. Kenneth Adams says:

    I started kindergarten that year. We were sent to the convent accross the street from St. Joe church for classes until the new school could be built.

  4. Tina says:

    Thanks for commenting! Natchaug School also took in some of the students. My grandfather was a custodian for St. Mary’s Church, they lived in a house right on the corner where the school library is now. The house was torn down so the new school could be built.

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