Skyrocketing flames, kindled before midnight in a furnace room, heavily damaging the Century Inn along the National Pike, or Route 40, in Scenery Hill, Washington County, brought an end to the landmark’s 221 years of continuous operation.
The bed and breakfast, tavern and restaurant, with 20 rooms in the ridge-top village in North Bethlehem, caught fire at 11:57 p.m. Monday in a rear wood-frame addition to the stone inn.
State Police Fire Marshal Chad Scrip said the fire was accidental. It quickly spread from the furnace room through the back additions before consuming the interior of the structure, made of stone quarried at the site, with large hand-hewn walnut beams and front windows with upper and lower sashes, each with 12 panes of glass.
The entire structure also served as a museum of early architecture, antiques, important artwork, framed historic photographs, tools, guns and glassware, most of which are believed to have been damaged or destroyed.
Clay Kilgore, executive director of the Washington County Historical Society, said the inn was “one of the most iconic buildings in the county,” especially considering it opened in 1794, more than a decade before federally funded construction of the National Road started.
“When you walked into it, you got the entire history of the National Road, as it went through the middle of Washington County,” he said. “It was kind of a timeline. It has seen the history of Washington County from the beginning.”
His reaction to the fire, he said, “is the same sickness in the pit of my stomach you get when you find out a family member has passed away. For Washington County history, it truly is a day to mourn.”
Megin Harrington and her husband, attorney Gordon Harrington, who died in an airplane crash in 1987, began running the inn in the early 1970s after inheriting it from his parents, Gordon and Mary Harrington, who bought it in 1945. Ms. Harrington lived in the inn.
“Luckily we’re closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, so no guests were in the six rooms here in the building,” she said.
Her 35-year-old son Gordon, scheduled to be married there on Sept. 17, had stopped by for a brief visit and was about to leave when he encountered billows of smoke. He used his cell phone to summon his mother upstairs to “get out right away.”
“When I reached the first floor,” she said, “there was so much smoke I couldn’t even see Gordon. It all happened so quickly.”
On the way out, she managed to grab the Whiskey Rebellion flag, thought to be the only one in existence. But likely destroyed, among many artifacts and antiques, were a highboy built in 1740, a Welsh dresser from the 1600s, valuable artwork and a collection of 20 embroidered samplers from the 18th century.
The Ellsworth Volunteer Fire Department arrived at 12:15 a.m. to find flames shooting through the rear roof. They pumped water from a nearby hydrant until local water authority officials notified Ellsworth Chief Craige Pysh that the community water supply was critically low, forcing firefighters to rely on up to 15 tanker trucks from nine or more fire departments from three counties to provide enough water to extinguish the fire by 3:30 a.m.
The interior of the structure was gutted but most of the frame and stone walls remain standing.
“It’s a very sad night when I got the call to come up here for this,” Chief Pysh said, reporting no injuries.
In its day, the inn hosted the likes of Andrew Jackson — twice — with visits from James K. Polk, the Marquis de Lafayette and Henry Clay. Ms. Harrington said George Washington stopped there, and there’s recent evidence that Abraham Lincoln had breakfast there.
Discussions among friends and neighbors already are underway about a crowdfunding campaign to restore the inn, which has been a favorite haunt of musicians, artists and history buffs. It usually has a full schedule of special events and weddings and a menu featuring such pioneer fare as venison, blue carp and Cornish hen.
“It’s awful what happened but some good things already are happening and other good things will happen,” said neighbor and sometimes inn employee William Harvey, an architectural designer.
In the aftermath, Ms. Harrington said she couldn’t place a value on her loss but considered most items to be priceless.
“I was lucky enough to be responsible for this place, to maintain it as its caretaker, and my job was to keep it alive and ever more authentic,” she said. “I just feel that I let the building down and lost so much.”
David Templeton: dtempleton@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1578
First Published: August 18, 2015, 9:30 a.m.
Updated: August 19, 2015, 3:25 a.m.
