Overview:
By reading this story you are helping keep the memory alive of those who died in this tragedy. My long-term goal is to be able to make sure there is a proper memorial marker on the actual site or within feet of the site, verses being miles away or the historical society/village not displaying one at all. When this happens I would like to assist in planning a candlelit vigil to say all their names aloud and maybe give them a real closure after 60-plus years.
— Kandi McCrea
EDITOR’S NOTE: This story was authored by Kandi McCrea. Here is the link to McCrea’s original blog with the article: https://kandiblaze.wordpress.com/2024/11/21/forgotten-fitchville-ohio-holocaust-22-bodies-remain-unclaimed-after-63-in-total-perished-at-the-golden-age-nursing-home/
FITCHVILLE — There’s a dark and forgotten history that haunts the village of Fitchville, just six miles north of Greenwich.
One might even be in disbelief that on a cold November night, 63 people died in a fire, and many of them were tied and restrained to their beds with no option of fleeing.
What you are about to read is a factual story on a tragic event that happened the early morning of Nov. 23, 1963. The story was overshadowed by the national tragedy that happened less than 15 hours earlier; the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
A mourning nation didn’t notice the smaller headline, “Holocaust At Golden Age Nursing Home.”
It included gut-wrenching details and accounts from firefighters and locals about burned bodies restrained to twisted metal bed frames, the remains of charred residents behind wheelchairs that were too big to fit through the narrow bedroom doorways, and confused and disoriented residents going back into an inferno to suffer their final fate.
When we read warning labels, see caution signs, or a note new fire or safety code is implemented, it’s often because of a tragedy or accident that occurred; this rings true with the Golden Age Nursing Home.
Until this event, inspections and regulations were left to the states, and there were no requirements for sprinklers, fire drills, or safety evacuation plans.
It was triggered by this catastrophe.
The real life horror story began in a former toy factory in the small village of Fitchville. Unbeknownst to anyone, an electrical fire began in the attic of the one-story, L-shaped building shortly before 5 a.m.
A Pennsylvania truck driver noticed sparks on the north end of the roof and arcing wires through the pines of the front lawn. He stopped immediately to get the attention of a staff member who was unaware and preparing breakfast for the 84 residents in the home.
While trying to call the operator to relay that the volunteer fire department was needed, the pair discovered phone lines had already melted and the blaze was rapidly engulfing everything in its path. The two ran to a neighboring house to call for help.
As passers-by and locals saw the flames, they came to assist. The nursing home residents could be heard inside banging around and screaming for help.
Those on the scene encountered confused and elderly patients, many with debilitating neurological disabilities. The inferno and confusion that was unfolding at the Golden Age Nursing Home, along with the lack of staff or people to assist, left several residents wondering aimlessly around outside in the cold November weather. Only 21 of the facility’s 84 residents survived.
Sadly and almost unbelievable to most, some of these patients were seen going back into the blaze to obtain their only belongings.
Within 8-10 minutes after the initial phone call, volunteer firefighters, ambulances, and additional personnel from surrounding areas would arrive on scene to what must have felt like hell on earth.
The glow and intense heat of the raging fire could be seen for miles outside the village. The smell of burning human flesh consumed the air with the rolling smoke. Melting tar from the roof became molten lava and the the intense flames climbed, engulfed, and consumed everything in their path.
There wasn’t much the firefighters could do except drown the remains of the building with water and await the horrible aftermath.
Those passing by, including truckers, escorted the wondering nursing home patients that had made it out to their running vehicles, in hopes of keeping them warm and safe. Victims were eventually taken to the nearest hospital in Norwalk.
The hospital staff didn’t know what to fully expect, only that some of those arriving were badly burned and had a variety of mental challenges.
The fire and heat collapsed the walls and disintegrated the roof. The heat was so intense it melted a glass-block window into one big teardrop. The former toy factory that had been somewhat re-wired and passed recent inspection, had now burned to the ground.
The scene was gruesome, even for the those equipped and trained for arriving on such a tragic structure fire. With no advanced planning or fire protocols for evacuation, firefighters found some of the deceased piled up against a locked exit that should have led them to safety. These victims were literally within inches of escaping with their lives.
Approximately 65-70 metal beds of the patients were laid out in a couple of rows. Everything including the mattresses had burned, exposing bed springs under their disfigured corpses.
In one doorway sat a burned wheelchair frame with the remains of a charred mass that had been sitting in it. Behind it were two additional charred masses. A doorway they were trying to escape through was an inch or so too narrow for the wheelchair to fit through.
In the smoke and chaos the disoriented patients couldn’t discern a way to make the chair or themselves fit through. They too became victims that were desperately trying to get to safety.
Laws for the disabled and building codes for wheelchair width had not yet been set in 1963. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) wouldn’t be signed and officially go into effect until 1990.
Witnesses and first responders will never forget the horrific scene. Partial remains of a couple residents were discovered seeking refuge under their wooden dressers. Nowhere was safe or survivable from the fire for those unable to make it outside.
Bodies were identified best as possible. If they were in their numbered bed, the authorities knew who it was. Some had certain characteristics that were highly noticeable still; like a gentleman with red hair.
Government officials were told at the time that they weren’t 100% sure on the remains of each individual, but it was the closest they could come.
The Ohio State Patrol decided to use the Fitchville Grade School on Elm Street as a temporary and makeshift morgue. Once the bodies that could be ID’d were identified, they were transported to the schools gymnasium where a white sheet was hung from a clothesline that stretched across the room.
This was where funeral directors gathered with families to claim or help identify the remains of those who perished.
The Golden Age Nursing Home survivors that could speak, didn’t like to talk about what happened to them. Some of the survivors had prior disabilities that barely allowed them to communicate, or be verbal in any form. Those were often the type of people that were placed in this home.
The nursing home residents that survived and understood what happened wanted answers. They wanted to know why that night happened.
Some families had no financial means to burry their dead relatives. A group of compassionate funeral directors took care of those 22 unclaimed souls. The same funeral directors took it upon themselves with no other financial assistance to provide the body bags, caskets, vaults, and grave marker.
A mass gravesite with an individual graveside service was held for those 22 unclaimed fire victims. All 22 caskets buried in one large grave, together — much like they were housed and bedded at the nursing home. The Woodlawn Cemetery in Norwalk donated a small section of the land for the common grave site.
A large tree has grown behind it over the years as a memorial.
One of the saddest accounts is a gentleman that spoke of knowing some of the relatives to those that were unclaimed. He stated that there were those in the local community that felt too embarrassed by the reasoning their relative was at the nursing home, so they chose to never come forward to claim their own family.
A few miles down the road from the incident there was once a state route rest stop. At one time it had an Ohio historical marker that spoke briefly of the Golden Age Nursing Home fire and mentioned that it happened nearby. The actual site of the tragedy is not marked.
The names of those who died are listed below:
Those who perished in the fire
Rest in Peace as You Are Not Forgotten:
November 23rd, 1963
Mary Baldo
Frank Bandeen
Leslie Benethun
Mary Berganski
Harry Berman
Mary Boyer
William Brockman**
Robert Carey**
Martha Carpenter**
Pauline Charneky
Lonnie Clark
William Cox
Quida Davis**
Marie Defrank
Christine DeMuth**
John Doran**
Agnes Driscol
Minnie Dwyer
Reuben Echelbarger
Ella Ehle
Samuel Factor**
Josephine Gormek
John Hanon
Marguerite Hermes
Clara Hile
Clayton Hires
Ruby Hohlfelder**
Lucy Holmes**
George Jenhaus
Emma Johnson**
Louise Kehrers
John Kerchner**
Leo Krueger**
John Kuczinski**
Logan Lamb**
Maude Lehman
Katie Lepis**
John Linder
Anna Lothi
Lena Lynn
Margaret MacDonald
Margaret McNary
Mamie Malloy**
Tony Marlette
Walter Meilander
Henry Parnell
Andrew Pavulus**
Maude Reid
Sam Rood
James Rook
Louis Rosenberg
Gottlieb Schulke
Charles Shamek
Luby Smoley**
August Solli
Charles Steirert
Upson Todd
Angelina Traut**
Metta Tretchel
Mrs. Underwood
Grace Waters**
Charlotte Whelen
John White**
(**indicates one of the 22 unclaimed victims)