Electrical cause likely in fire that destroyed historic Egremont Inn

SOUTH EGREMONT, Mass. — A wiring malfunction is the likely cause of the Dec. 11 fire that destroyed the rambling Egremont Inn on Sheffield Road, Fire Chief William H. Turner said Monday. He said there has been no official determination — the state fire marshal’s office is in charge of the investigation — “but we lean to electrical.�

Turner said the fire “started in a utility chase, where the wires pass through.�

When he arrived at the scene, he said, “four windows were  broken out and flames were visible. An alarm should have been sent in when there was smoke — which is why we lean to electrical as causing the fire.â€�

He said 18 fire departments either responded to the scene or provided backup at neighboring fire stations. At one time, there were ladder trucks from Great Barrington, North Canaan and Hudson, N.Y., pouring water on the building.

Turner said it was quickly determined the structure was empty — although meals had been served in the dining room the evening before, there were no guests — but he would not send men inside because the maze of hallways and open stairwells made it extremely unsafe.

“I was afraid it would collapse,� he said.

Turner said it was heart-wrenching to see the historic building burn. Close neighboring homes and buildings were saved, however.

Parts of the inn were 200 or more years old. Francis B. Hare opened a tavern in a small building in South Egremont sometime after 1780. The structure was moved when a new Sheffield Road was built in about 1800, according to a town history. Hare’s son Levi ran the business, then sold to William and Jerome Hollenbeck. Numerous owners over the years, including Sanford H. Karner, transformed the stagecoach stop into a substantial country inn and restaurant.

A consortium of townsmen ran the property as a temperance house before quarryman Chester Goodale purchased it in 1853. He enlarged it into a summer hotel. Goodale’s son Samuel carried on the property  (also for a time called the South Egremont Hotel) in 1859, then John Miller and after him Walter B. Peck took over.

When Major Hugh Smiley — kin to the Mohonk Mountain House Smileys — acquired the Mount Everett Inn in 1931 he made it an anchor of his Olde Egremont Inc. historic resort village along with the Egremont Tavern (now Kenver’s sporting goods store) and Jug End Barn (now a state reservation).

The present owners of the 12.5-acre property are Robert Johnson and Marie Morales-Johnson, who purchased the inn a year and a half ago from Steven A. Waller and Karen E. Taufman-Waller.

The Johnsons were reportedly in Connecticut at the time of the fire.

The Wallers had owned the Egremont Inn since 1994. From 1985 to 1986, Salisbury residents Peter F. Fitting (now a dietary supervisor at Noble Horizons) and Jane Fitting (now a librarian at The Hotchkiss School) managed the inn.

The building has toppled in but has not yet been razed.