Editor’s Note: This article is part of Reflections, a special supplemental magazine to The Hopewell News and News-Patriot detailing local history.
By Ashley McLeod, Staff Writer
Sep 25, 2015, 14:08
HOPEWELL — This year marks the 100th anniversary of a devastating event that may, in fact, have made Hopewell what it is today. In 1915, a fire wiped out the small city, causing millions of dollars in damage, and left approximately 25,000 residents homeless. This event had a drastic effect on the history of the city. In the years leading up to the fire, Hopewell was not even called Hopewell. The area we now know today had not been incorporated as its own locality and was technically considered to be part of Prince George County. There wasn’t much in the area; a few farming families were present, such as the Eppes, along with fishermen who came and went. The area was still recovering from the aftermath of the Civil War.
In 1912, the DuPont family was looking to build a new dynamite factory and came to the area.
“They wanted an isolated place, near the water, where they could build and operate the factory,” said Jeanie Langford, the assistant librarian and archivist at the Hopewell Library’s Ann K. and Preston H. Leake Local History and Genealogy Collection.
The property was bought, and the factory-built, which began an influx of new residents coming to the area. People came from all over to come and work in the new factory. The new workers came from places like Alabama, Tennessee and New York. At about this time, World War I had begun, and many from Eastern Europe were fleeing to America to escape the war. A large portion of these immigrants were Greek, Czech, Polish, Russian and Armenian.
Due to the start of the war, the dynamite factory transformed into a gun cotton factory, becoming the largest in the world at the time. The factory can’t run without staff, so a lot of the European immigrants move to the area for work.
Dupont builds housing for the immigrants, and also has someone to help them learn English. The workers build their lives at their new jobs, and they are paid very well for their work. Because of the number of new people coming to the area, it soon began to grow. Buildings made of wood were quickly built to serve as clothing stores, groceries, doctors’ offices, bars and a variety of other places that people would need to go to live. Hopewell had started to become a well-populated up and coming area.
“It was like the Wild West on the East Coast,” said Langford.
The morning of Dec. 9, 1915, started out like any other morning in Hopewell. People went to work, whether it was in the factory or in the grocery down the street. And then things quickly turned bad.
“Everyone blamed it on a Greek restaurant. Somehow an oil stove gets kicked over, and with all that wood, it spreads,” Langford said.
The small fire began in a three-story building on Appomattox Street and spread quickly through the wooden houses and businesses, destroying around 400 different buildings. People began to flee town, trying to escape the blaze. With no fire or police department, the whole area was in chaos. The plant shuts down, and workers filled the fields around it trying to put out what flames had made it that far. Dupont was doing everything they could to make sure the fire did not reach the plant, which would have been an even larger catastrophe. Power lines were collapsing, which cut off half of the water being sent to the plant, so the water in Hopewell was cut off. In case the fire did reach the plant, they wanted to be sure there would be enough of a water supply to put it out. This also caused the fire in the small city to continue burning. Several buildings near the railroad tracks were blown up with dynamite in order to try and stop the fire from spreading to the plant.
By 8 o’clock that night, the fire had finally burned itself out. A lot of the people had left town by now and were headed toward Petersburg or Richmond by train, in buggies, or on foot. Whoever was left in the area was stranded and had nowhere to sleep. A lot of workers slept in the fields because there was nowhere else to go. In all, 24 city squares were affected by the fire.
In just one day, the bustling new area was completely wiped out.
Since there was no police force in Hopewell, the State Militia was called in to help, and ended up staying in the area until March of 1916. There are no deaths on account of the fire. Because it started in the daylight, it was easier for people to see it coming and to try and get away.
The plant reopened that night at 9, and the rebuilding of the area began as soon as it was cool enough to do so. The importance of the factory was high, as the war was ongoing and the product was very important in fighting the war. The governor of Virginia at the time told people in the area to rebuild with more brick buildings so that something like this would not happen again.
Rebuilding the area ends up costing between $1 million and $3 million. Back then, $1 million now would equal $23,248,712.87. Help is coming from all over the place. The YMCA and churches in Petersburg open their doors to help house people. Dupont even received an offer of help from the Ringling Brothers Circus, which was not traveling at the time because it was winter. The circus had heard about the devastating fire and offered to bring their commissary, cooks, and whatever else they could to Hopewell to help those who were affected by the fire.
Within days, trains were bringing supplies to the area in order to rebuild. Merchants built and opened up shop again, and this time the buildings were better built than before.
The area petitioned the governor so that they could become incorporated as an actual city, which meant residents could build and maintain a fire and police department, and build a local government.
“Even though the governor is a little reluctant, it is awarded to them in February and becomes official July 1, 1916. Hopewell officially becomes a city,” said Langford.
While the fire completely destroyed the small town, it also may have been exactly what the area needed. After the fire, better buildings, and more buildings were built. People saw the area as a fresh new place to live. It gave residents more of a reason to push to become officially a city.
“It may have been the best thing to ever happen to the area. Without it, they would have no incentive to build better buildings, they may have not pushed to be incorporated, they may not have seen the need for a fire or police department,” Langford said.
If the fire had not happened, the area may have kept on with everyday life, and who knows how long of a time it would have taken the residents to make the move to become incorporated, and to build and prosper to be the Hopewell that we know today.
There are many photographs from long ago which show Hopewell in what it was before the fire. Buildings and streets have changed, but there are many places that are the same. Langford is currently working with Johnny Altman on pinpointing exactly what was where before the fire broke out. By matching certain landmarks, you are able to figure out where buildings from that time would be now, allowing you to picture what Hopewell looked like in its beginning and taking a step back in history.
