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Show Furniture Mart Fights Fire Keeps Normal Business Operation "Business as usual" was the watchword this week at the South East Furniture after the $100,000 fire which destroyed the second floor room department depart-ment and offices last Friday. The lighting system used on the huge Christmas tree at South East have been put into service, so the store is brilliantly bril-liantly lighted even though fire put all regular store lights out of commission. Renovation and redecoration of the damaged departments is well underway and probably will be finished within two or three weeks. Horace, Gordon, Morgan and Calvin have nothing but praise for their 175 employees, who pitched in Saturday morning to help clean up" the debris left by the Friday evening blaze. ''Our up-to-date fire doors were closed as soon as the blaze was discovered." said Gordon. "They kept the fire confined to a comparatively comparat-ively small area." The store was remodeled sjome years ago and built in sections so that any fire could be controlled in just this way. Fortunately, the telephone switchboard was not damaged. It was in operating condition right through the fire. Offices of Morgan and Gordon Sorensen, as well as the stock control center and customer service desk were destroyed. The latter has been installed downstairs near the side door temporarily. The Sorensen brothers are enthusiastic about the work of the fire department. Said Gordon, "I have never seen such systematized work in my life. Each man knew exactly what to do to combine his efforts with those of all the other men." Gordon praised the method used to get rid of the inches deep water on the second floor. "It was swept to the head of the stairs," he said, "where it was guided into a canvas chute to run just like a river down the stairs and out the side door , without damaging the first floor. Visitors to the store will be hard put to find any concrete evidence of the fire. Sidewalk superintendents will find there is no place for them to ply their avocation. By Monday, the burned area was completely boarded off and workmen were busy repairing the damage. Cause of the fire was overloaded over-loaded electrical wiring. It burned inside walls and ceiling of the second floor for some time before shorting out the lights and flashing through the barriers to where it could be seen. Customers and employees were quickly evaluated. Only casualties were two store employees and one fireman. All three were overcome by smoke as they battled the flames. The first alarm was given shortly after 5:p.m. Friday. Other alarms were turned In a few minutes later. " Sugar House- was already (Continued on rage 3) (Continued from page 1) Fire crowded with Dollar Days zho?'tTZ anJ the la:e afternoon Lcific rush when the fire broke cut. LInny other persons were a-.'.ractoJ to the scene by radio cr.d tc revision reports of the cLcsicr. The police department quickly re-routed traffic around ti 2 ;u;a to give fire fighting equipment room to maneuver. Two fire trucks and a number of firemen were still cn the job Saturday morning. The men were completing the mopup operations, and checking check-ing to make sure the fire w?s not going to break out again. The dawnstairs offices and some departments were open at South East on Saturday morning only 15 hours after the blaze was first discovered. |