Utter devastation. That was the look on Holly Williamson’s face Wednesday afternoon, standing in her front yard at 422 Cherry Street in Galion and surveying the charred remains of her home.
The smell of burnt wood filled the air, melted remains of the house’s siding curled away from the blackened structure, and wisps of steam rose from the wet piles of wood where the front porch used to be.
Taking it all in, tears filled Williamson’s eyes as the gravity of the situation settled on her shoulders.
“Everything is gone,” she sobbed. “How can something like this happen?”
Williamson and her three children are currently living in a hotel in Galion after a fire destroyed their rental home on Tuesday. Galion firefighters received a call at 3:34 p.m. that the home was engulfed in flames. Lt. Greg Peoples described the fire as “fully involved.”
“We believe it started from an electrical outlet sitting just under the window,” said Peoples. “We believe there was a router plugged into it. The boy noticed the outlet smoking so he went to tell the neighbor, and when he came back the drapes had already caught on fire.”
That boy was Korrey Vance, Williamson’s 14-year-old son who was home doing dishes at the time the fire began. Williamson and her daughter, 16-year-old Rabecca Vance, were in Ontario shopping for a book Rabecca needed for school when Williamson received a call from an unknown number.
“A lady called me on the phone and said the house was gone,” Williamson recalled. “I said, what do you mean it’s gone? She said it’s gone, and your son is with me.”
The lady, a woman Williamson identified as Taustin, was driving past the house when she saw Korrey Vance collapse in the front yard while exiting his home. The woman grabbed Korrey and put him in her car before calling 911.
Korrey Vance said he first noticed something wrong when the wall surrounding an outlet in the living room was black, with sparks coming from the area. After notifying the neighbors of a possible electrical fire, Korrey returned to find the drapes, carpet and his little sister’s chair were on fire.
“I immediately ran back over and said everybody get out and call 911,” Korrey remembered. “I tried smacking (the fire) out with something nonflammable. I ran back over and said you have to get everything valuable out, and when I ran back in and looked in the room the couch was completely on fire.”
Korrey first let out the family’s two Yorkie dogs, but noticed the family Labrador named Buttercup was missing.
“I ran back in and I had to get Buttercup, she was upstairs so I ran upstairs into my sister’s closet and the carpet was on fire up there,” said Korrey. “I grabbed Buttercup and ran out of the room and down the stairs, and one of the stairs broke. I went outside and had a panic attack and they took me to the hospital and put me on oxygen for about three hours.”
Peoples confirmed Korrey was checked for smoke inhalation and released. When asked if he was ever afraid during the fire, Korrey said he didn’t actually know.
“It wasn’t a fear factor; it was just the factor of getting stuff done as quickly as possible,” he said. “I got the dog and I got the neighbors out as quickly as possible.”
In July of this year, members of the Galion community rallied together to get Korrey a new bicycle to make it easier for him to help out his mother. The bicycle lay in a blackened, twisted heap outside the burnt home on Wednesday.
Peoples stated firefighters from Bucyrus and Crestline also responded to assist with the fire, working until 7:19 p.m. when he finally left the scene. The attached apartment suffered only water and smoke damage, thanks to strong winds blowing the fire to the east and towards Williamson’s house.
“When the drapes caught fire it probably shattered the glass, and the wind was blowing toward their house,” said Peoples. “There was slight heat damage to the garage behind the house, and slight heat damage to the house at the east.”
Peoples estimated the damage at approximately $75,000 to the property, and approximately $8,000 for the contents inside. Charles Miller of Galion is the property owner.
“The owner’s insurance will come look at it and see if it’s worth salvaging,” said Peoples. “In my experience, they’re going to tear this house down.”
According to Peoples, Williamson’s side of the residence at 422 Cherry Street is considered a total loss. Firefighter Neil Evans stated on Thursday that the insurance company would determine whether the entire structure will be considered a total loss. He noted Peoples’ official report states the attached apartment only suffered smoke and water damage.
“You can clean clothes and stuff. There are things you can extract (the smell) out of and there’s things that you can’t, but you’d have to weed through all that,” said Evans. “What you see (on Williamson’s side), that’s an obvious total lost. Everything was cooked to a crisp.”
On Wednesday afternoon Williamson waited in her front yard as Peoples and firefighter Chuck Altstadt surveyed the inside of the home for any personal belongings. The two firefighters retrieved a safe from the basement, a small box of jewelry from the upstairs bathroom, and a small pile of charred pictures from the living room where the fire began.
At the sight of the pictures, Williamson immediately broke down – they were Polaroid pictures of her son, William, who died after he was born prematurely 17 years ago. They were the only pictures she had of her tiny son, the one thing she had most regretted losing in the fire.
“They said everything can be replaced and I’m like everything except for my son,” said Williamson. “I only have four pictures of him. And they got to save two of them.”
“There was a little table sitting next to the window,” said Peoples. “For some reason something fell down and protected the pictures.”
On Wednesday, Korrey and Rabecca attended school wearing the same clothes they wore the day before in an effort to keep some kind of routine in their world. Williamson’s youngest daughter, 19-month-old Hailey, was in daycare on Wednesday; Williamson took the baby in during June of 2013 after the baby’s parents overdosed on heroin.
Currently, everything Williamson owns is in the back seat of her gold Taurus car. The family of four has enough money to stay in their hotel room for two more days – after that, Williamson said she has no idea what she’ll do.
“(Korrey) had not been doing so good in school with his grades, I think he was just giving up because we’ve just been so struggling,” she reflected. “Maybe this is a sign to get back on the right foot.”
In light of her family’s tragedy, 16-year-old Rabecca created her own inspirational quote: “Look forward, because in this moment the past is irrelevant.”
“All of our pictures that got burned in there, and just all those memories that are gone now, we still have them in our hearts,” said Rabecca. “We just have to look forward to what comes next and keep going forward, because that’s all we can do now. Everything else is gone.”
Despite her family’s current situation, Williamson still managed to smile on Wednesday as she held onto a happy memory: taking a road trip to Toledo on Saturday, Rabecca’s birthday, with all three of her children singing in the car to a Taylor Swift song.
“We have so much fun as a family,” said Williamson, a far-off look in her eye. “We’ll get past this,” she resolved. “We’ve been through worse.”
“All of our pictures that got burned in there, and just all those memories that are gone now, we still have them in our hearts,” said 16-year-old Rabecca Vance.
Story updated to clarify damages to duplex. Two families were impacted by the fire and this story reflects the total loss to one family. A benefit has been planned for the families and the story has been updated to include that information.
