Inspectors hope interviews will lead them to the cause of a blaze on Summer Street.
AUBURN – Fire inspectors spent Friday digging through the charred remains of a home at 949 Summer St.
By the end of the day, they still were not able to find the origin of the blaze that destroyed the house and garage Wednesday night. They decided to return the property to the owners and continue their investigation by looking for people who may have more information.
Dan Roy Jr., an inspector for the Maine State Fire Marshal’s Office, said it was still too early to declare the fire suspicious.
“First, we have to eliminate all accidental causes,” he said.
In this case, Roy continued, that is tough because the damage is so extensive. The fire destroyed the 200-year-old house in less than an hour, leaving only the chimney and the frame of the garage standing.
Inspectors from the Fire Marshal’s Office spent Thursday and Friday sifting through the rubble and fallen walls and ceilings. They searched for heavily damaged spots and burn patterns.
They also interviewed the owners, Richard and Marta Bolles, and an employee who had been working in their home office early Wednesday.
According to Roy, the Bolleses, who moved to Maine from New Jersey in 2002, ran a small business out of their home. It was a bartering operation, in which they would organize deals between companies that wanted to trades products and services.
Investigators will likely conduct more interviews with the Bolleses, their employee and witnesses who stopped to watch the fire. They may also contact some of the Bolleses’ clients in New Jersey.
“We just want to make sure everything was OK, nothing was going on,” Roy said.
The Bolleses were in Portland with their two young children when the fire started. They returned home at 8 a.m. to find their home and garage destroyed.
The couple bought the house in the spring of 2002 from local chiropractor Michael Cyr. Before that, it belonged to state Rep. Thomas Shields, R-Auburn, and Auburn City Councilor Bethel Shields.
According to the Shields’ daughter, Dana, the old farmhouse was built in the 1700s across Summer Street. It was dragged by oxen in 1800 to its current location.
Her parents bought it in the mid-1970s and fixed it up, exposing many of the old pegs and beams.
“It was unbelievably beautiful,” Dana Shields said. “I have so many great memories from that house.”
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