LIVERMORE FALLS – Skip Pritsky’s hands shook Saturday as he watched more than 50 firefighters fight a stubborn blaze that ripped through the home he shared with his mother, Marge Pritsky.
It was below freezing and his hair was still wet from a shower. He wore borrowed clothes as he smoked a cigarette across from the older-style 2-story house with attached 1-story addition on Pleasant Street.
Pritsky, 52, was in the shower just before 10 a.m. when he heard smoke detectors going off, he said. He stepped out and smelled smoke. When he checked out his first floor apartment he saw flames around an electric space heater that his dogs must have knocked over, he said.
He had time to wrap a towel around himself and run down to his 81-year-old mother’s side of the house, he said.
They called police and were able to get his German shepherds, Rin Tin Tin, 8, and Sadie, 11 or 12 years old, out to a car, but the youngest German shepherd, Tasha, 18 months old, wouldn’t come out, Pritsky said.
Tasha and his mother’s cat, KC, perished in the blaze.
Pritsky said he had stopped and watched the fire in the blue towel and his mother’s pink slippers, which was all he had on, for a few minutes before people at the First Baptist Church across the way gave him some clothes. Parishioners were having a rummage sale at the time.
Marge Pritsky had just finished putting away groceries when her son came running over, she said.
She had tears in her eyes as she watched the house burn.
She told paramedic Kalem Malcolm of Community Emergency Services ambulance about the dogs in her car in the back yard. She also told him about a strongbox with her personal papers in a closet. Malcolm relayed the message to firefighters.
Firefighters from Fayette, Jay, Livermore, Livermore Falls and Wilton fought the fire, which spread quickly and could not be stopped before it gutted the main house and the top floor of the addition. Firefighters were spraying water on the fire from all sides, and evacuated a house adjacent to the Pritskys’ as a precaution. Farmington and East Dixfield firefighters stood by at Jay’s two fire stations.
Firefighters were able to salvage some of Marge Pritsky’s belongings, including her grandmother’s doughnut kettle, a diamond ring her late husband gave her, some photos and other items.
But many cherished items and antiques were destroyed.
Pritsky said it was strange, but Friday night she read some of her great-grandfather’s papers, dating back to the 1800s. She hoped that they had survived.
Livermore Falls Assistant Fire Chief Jim Chretien said the house was an old structure with no fire stops, and that the fire spread quickly.
Rosy’s Variety provided sandwiches to the firefighters, and Rosie Wilcox and Flora Jones brought them hot drinks and water.
By the time the fire was under control, Skip Pritsky was wearing three layers of shirts, a jacket, handmade mittens and hat, boots, and pants that were too large that he was able to hold up.
Someone had stopped and gave him the telephone number of a woman willing to take the dogs, and several people had offered him and his mother places to live. He had lost everything, including his eyeglasses and keys to Livermore Falls High School, where he is a custodian. His checkbook was in his locked car, he said, which was parked in the driveway with a key in the ignition.
Marge Pritsky said the house was insured.
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