By Timothy Churchill,Staff Writer

PARIS – A dilapidated barn used to dry and mount deer heads was destroyed by fire Thursday afternoon. There were no injuries.

Owner Roger Paine said he was preparing to dry two deer heads in the barn at 654 High St. before the fire started.

“I stopped in (the barn) and checked on the wood stove and everything was perfect,” he said, but after he left, black smoke started gushing out the front door.

The fire was reported at 12:40 p.m., Paris Fire Chief Brad Frost said, and when firefighters arrived six minutes later the barn was engulfed in smoke and flames. A storage container near the barn was also burned.

Norway and West Paris fire departments were called to help, with Oxford Fire Department standing by in Paris.

The high wind blew flames into a grass field owned by neighbor Glen Young, Frost said. About 1:10 p.m., the barn and container fires were extinguished, but several firefighters were still dousing hot spots, and others were extinguishing flames in the woods. A tank truck drew water from a pond on the Young property.

Paine said he had planned to tear the barn down. “It was pretty well decayed,” he said.

The storage container was filled with unused household items, he said.

Frost said State Fire Marshal Rick Shepard is investigating the cause of the fire, but “unofficially” it was believed to be the wood stove.

This was the second fire on High Street this week. On Tuesday, a mobile home owned by Paris Assistant Fire Chief William Buffington was destroyed. The cause was determined to be “unintentional,” Frost said.