Ekleberry fire not suspicious
BUCYRUS - The cause of the enormous fire that consumed the former Ekleberry Poultry building on South Spring Street on Sunday afternoon was still under investigation Monday afternoon, but the Bucyrus Fire Department said the blaze is not considered suspicious.
The building was, however, filled with used theater seating, which contributed to the intensity of the blaze, Fire Department Lt. John Schiefer said. The long building, a wood-frame structure on cement block that extended from 823 S. Spring St. west to Grove Avenue on the south side of Bucyrus, was owned by Wyandot Seating, which apparently utilized the site as a warehouse.
Two people were also living in the building; they were not injured in the fire and the American Red Cross is helping them with their relocation needs. Two puppies were rescued from the upstairs apartment. One then ran away while the other is being cared for by a nearby resident, according to the Humane Society of Crawford County.
As of Monday afternoon, while the investigation into the blaze continued, firefighters had succeeded in putting out any lingering hot spots in what quickly grew into the largest fire in Bucyrus in several years.
"We still have a truck out there, but it will be coming back shortly," Schiefer said.
As the fire raged Sunday, a large crowd gathered to watch firefighters from four departments - Bucyrus, Galion, Crestline and Marion Township in Marion County - work to put it out from the ground and with ladder trucks. "The whole town of Bucyrus is at this fire," one person wrote on Twitter Sunday. Smoke from the blaze, which drifted southwest, could be seen from as far away as Marion County.
Onlookers were advised by emergency personnel to stay upwind of the smoke, as rubber and Styrofoam were burning. According to Wyandot Seating's website, the business had nearly 5,800 theater seats in its inventory, all Irwin, Hussy and RGS brands. The company could not be reached on Monday, but the business, formed in 1977, listed the building at 823 S. Spring St. as its 25,000-square-foot warehouse.
The building had not been used by the former Ekleberry Poultry for at least 20 to 25 years. That business, founded in Bucyrus in 1925, significantly expanded its operations on South Spring Street in 1982, to allow for in-plant packaging of fresh chickens.
At that time, Ekleberry Poultry was able to process its poultry in one day and deliver it to stores the next, and serviced about 400 food stores and supermarkets in the state, in addition to a number of restaurants and carry-outs. The business was processing as many as 130,000 chickens a week during the 1980s.
By 1996, however, the building on South Spring had become the home of Total Warehousing Services Inc., which moved to a slightly larger facility on Isaac Beal Road three years later, followed by another move to a still larger facility in the Crossroads Industrial Park in 2002, from where it operates today.
Jerry Ekleberry, who had served as a plant manager at Ekleberry Poultry for 25 years, died in March at the age of 99. Maxine Ekleberry, the widow of the former plant's owner, Richard Ekleberry, lives in the Orchard Park retirement community in Bucyrus.
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Twitter: @ToddHillMNJ