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Arson suspectedRecords fire blazesOVERLAND, Mo. (AP)—Officials of the General Services Administration said today the Fire at the Military Personnel Records Center here remained dangerous but was still being confined to the sixth floor.“Large sections of the roof itself are collapsed, but the fire has not gone down below the floor of the sixth story,” Dr. James B. Rhodes said. “We’re certainly hopeful to contain it at the sixth, but that’s just conjecture.”Jeffery P. Hillelson, regional administrator of the GSA, said Thursday night he hoped the fire, which became a day old shortly after midnight Thursday, could be under control by noon today. But the blaze gained momentum Thursday night when flames leapt 20 to 30 feet into the sky, driving firemen out of the building and forcing them to use only ladder and snorkel trucks to combat the Fire.Rhodes said there was no estimate now as to when the fire will be brought under control, but an assistant fire chief at the scene was quoted early today as saying, “We hope to be out of here by tomorrow night.”The major problem in fighting the fire, according to Rhodes, is getting water to the center of the huge building, which is one block wide and two blocks long.“They’ve (firemen) have been able to pour a lot of water into the periphery of the sixth floor, but the most stubborn blaze is in the center of the floor, ’ ’ he explained.Rhodes added that the mass of tightly packed military records on the floor, %vhieh covers 180,000 square feet, has also been a factor in the inability of fire fighters to put out the blaze.Six firemen, who were among the members of 10 suburban St. Louis departments dispatched to the scene, have suffered minor injuries in combatting the blaze, which started on the sixth floor shortly after midnight Wednesday. Service and medical records on more than 20 million Army and Air Force servicemen, mostly those who served during the two world wars, are hosued on the building’s top floor.Sen. Stuart Symington, DMo., acting chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he has asked Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger to furnish his committee with a report on the cause of the fire and the extent of damage to the records.Officials of the GSA said arson may have been the cause of the blaze, and Hillelson said there had been 12 fires of “suspicious origin” in the building during the last six months.“It is currently being investigated by the FBI,” he said. Hillelson said he did notKANSAS CITY (AP) -- Bacon and canned fruits and canned vegetables will be hard to find on grocery shelves in a short time, say grocers.Today ends the first month of the price freeze President Nixon placed on food while exempting agricultural products. Farm prices have continued rising.“Producers and packers have finally realized they just can’t make any money while we’re still operating under the freeze,” said Wilbur L. Reust.known whether any of the 50 persons inside the building at the time the fire had broken out had been questioned. He said said a list of those employes existed and he said the record center had a “regular security force on duty around the clock. ”The job of reconstructing destroyed military records “will be the largest reconstruction job we’ve ever had,” according to Walter W. Stender, assistant national archivist.“Some of the records can be reconstructed from other records existing in the government and from copies of parts of the records given to other agencies,” Stender said. He added, however, that the center was the only depository for the complete record files on men from all branches of service.Stender said the loss of the records could “delay to some extent the receipt of benefits for some veterans.“Many of us have been taking a loss during the first month, hoping something would happen to better the situation,” Reust said, “we've been getting by pretty well with no noticeable shortages until now.”A wholesale grocer, Lady Baltimore Foods, Inc.. serving about 1,000 institutions such as hospitals and hotels, is having trouble getting canned fruits and vegetables, says general manager Jack Baraban.Bacon, fruit short
Newspaper Details
Jefferson City Post Tribune
Jefferson City, Missouri, US
Fri, Jul 13, 1973
Page 12
Full Page
Clipped by
Muskingum C.
OH, USA 18 Aug 2020
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