| Thousand Islands Railway Station Gananoque 24 September 1990 |
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Old Gananoque rstaurant destroyed in $200,000 fire GANANOQUE (CP) A wind-fed blaze early Monday morning destroyed the landmark Stationhouse Restaurant on the town's waterfront, causing about $200,000 damage. Strong winds were blowing out of the north when the entire 26-member Gananoque fire department arrived at the restaurant on the shores of the St. Lawrence River and found the 61-year-old former railway station engulfed in flames. Fire Chief Jim Stevenson said he didn't know what caused the blaze. No one was injured in the fire that also caused about $2,000 in heat damage to the nearby Canada Customs office. "It was a heritage building," Mayor Fred Delaney said. "You'll never, ever replace it." Ken Bassett, night clerk at a nearby hotel, called the fire department when he saw an unusually bright glow and heard what sounded like explosions. "It sounded like a muffled backfire. You know how an engine will backfire," he said. John Nalon, president of the Gananoque Historical Society, said he hoped the structure could be rebuilt as a museum with insurance money and matching grants from the Ontario Ministry of Culture and Communications. The building was erected in 1929 by the Thousand Islands Railway, owned by CNR, Nalon said. Railway lines once snaked along the Gananoque waterfront to serve the factories of the thriving industrial port |
Updated 31 May 2023