Fire ? probably caused by an early morning lightning storm Thursday ? has destroyed a rural Arkansas City farmhouse that a local family called home for 33 years before moving to town a couple years ago.
Firefighters from Ark City and Winfield arrived at the house at 30410 101st Rd. around 4 a.m, but it was already too late, says fire Capt. Les Parks. By then the fire had been going for quite some time and the home was a total loss.
"There isn’t a whole lot around it, so it could burn for awhile before anyone noticed," Parks said. "And it did."
No one was living in the home, which is owned by D.J. Palmer of Ark City. He says he and his wife moved to town after living in the house for over three decades. They weren’t interested in becoming landlords, so they just kept up the two-story house and had some cattle there.
The home was livable for sure and in pretty good shape for its age, according to Palmer.
"We raised our children there," he says. "And our grandchildren are as upset as anyone, they can remember that as ole grandpa and grandma’s place."
Fire officials have yet to name an official cause for the fire but suspect that a serious lightning storm in the area sparked the blaze. The home had electricity but never had a natural gas hookup because the family mostly burned wood for warmth.
Though he lives in the city limits now, Palmer says he’s already heard from a number of neighbors in the area of the old house who wanted to know about the fire.
There were some antiques inside and a few other things Palmer says the family "can’t ever replace." But the family has insurance and Palmer says he’s just glad no one was hurt.
He said his granddaughter, in a conversation with Palmer’s wife, summed it up best.
"She said, ‘I’m sure glad you weren’t in there grandma,’" he says.
