NORWAY – A bit of Norway’s downtown history is set to disappear when the remains of 256 Main St. are torn down today.

“It was a handsome house really,” said Gus Campbell, past president and a member of the Norway Historical Society, of the century-old home that is owned by Madeline Pratt and had been used in recent decades as a rooming house.

Flames ripped through the building during the late evening of Feb. 12 leaving six men and two women tenants homeless. Pratt’s daughter Vira Micklon, owner of All-Rite Accounting, which is located in a cement building behind the home, also lost her apartment and a cat in the fire.

The State Fire Marshal’s Office ruled the fire an accident. It appeared to have started near a first-floor fuse panel. The loss has been estimated at $300,000, but Pratt said she had no insurance.

Family friends were at the gutted house Monday removing the few salvageable items from the large two-story home. Although some of the iron, such as the intricately detailed radiators and architectural moldings, will be salvaged, other items such as beautiful carved mahogany woodwork and other period features will go down with the house.

“I’ll just crush it with an excavator,” said Wayne Kennagh, who is Pratt’s nephew. Kennagh said he will start tearing the back of the house down first. Once down, the remains of the house will be shipped to a Lewiston facility where it will be incinerated.

Campbell said he believes the house was built after 1894, when a fire ripped through downtown Norway taking down most of the eastern end, including 90 buildings.

Campbell said the house is a “double house” because it appears to have been built with two identical sides, not an uncommon practice at the turn of the century. Its bay windows on either side, elaborate porch with its highly decorated cornices and moldings, central staircase and transom doors showcased some of its early beauty.

The Maine Historic Preservation Commission, which designated the downtown area, including Pratt’s house, a state Historical District, has cited the area as one of the best examples of period architecture in Maine. It is surrounded by other homes, and the town’s library, which were also constructed after the great fire of 1894.

Pratt said she moved into the home in 1961 when she came to Norway with her family, and now lives only two doors down the street from it. Pratt said she won’t miss the problems of owning such a large home.

“I don’t think I will miss the headaches and work that comes with owning a rooming house,” she said. “To tell you the truth, the expenses were so high. It wasn’t even insured.”

The tenants have been resettled in another rooming house owned by Pratt on the other end of Main Street. All escaped uninjured, but many, including a tenant who had lived in the house for 30 years, lost the few belongings they came with.

“I furnish everything in the rooms. All they had were a few things in a bag. It was almost like a shelter,” she said.

Pratt said townspeople have been very good to her and the tenants.

“I think that I can speak for the tenants that people have been overly generous,” she said.

The future of the property lies now with her daughter, who will inherit the soon-to-be vacant corner lot, Pratt said.

“It will be out of my hands once it is taken down,” she said.