Sunday, August 23, 1964

From the San Francisco Chronicle and the San Francisco Examiner

Sunday, August 23rd, 1964 10:40am PDT


As best I recall, I was in the kitchen that morning with my mom and dad. As she was hovering over the stove, he and I were watching television. I remember the televised Sunday morning segment was about epilepsy and the incidental things that can trigger an attack or fit, such as the strobing lights of an emergency vehicle.


Suddenly, over the black and white footage and sounds of fire equipment rushing to the scene of a fire, my eldest sister Yvette came running up the hallway yelling, "Smoke! Smoke! Smoke!" She was in no way playing off the program.


She pointed to the kitchen window facing the rear of our property and in the direction of roofing company next door. This was the second fire to erupt next to our house in two weeks!


What my mom viewed when she went to look out the window I never saw, as the shade was drawn. I only remember her expression of alarm and her reflexive life and death determination to get us all to immediate safety.


I barely had time to dress while Yvette summoned the fire department. I called out for my two possessions, but only one of them left the house with me: a stuffed toy tiger.


We escaped unharmed into the street, Potrero Avenue to be exact, directly across from the
then emergency ward of the San Francisco General Hospital. There were six of us who were forced out that day: my parents, my eldest sister Yvette, my twin sister Georgene, and my uncle.My sister Angie, the seventh member of the Sanchez family was staying the month in San Jose with our aunt and uncle.


By now, the Crystal Springs Roofing Company was totally involved, with the flames cresting the side of our three story house.


Then came the fire engines, the crowds, and the press.


The photographer for the San Francisco Chronicle was the first from the press corps to arrive on the scene and quickly sussed out the residents of 988 Potrero Avenue. Of course my stuffed tiger was one of those story angles newspeople just love to cover. It's a natural, y'know, human interest an' all!


Unfortunately for the Chronicle, by the time their staff reporter showed up at the scene, my friend Carlos Sanchez had joined us. When the photographer pointed the reporter in our direction the latter came straight up to Carlos and me and asked,


"Is your name Sanchez?"
Carlos answered, "Yes. Carlos."
"'Sanchos'," noted the reporter, "What's your father's name?"
"Joseph."
"Then who's Manuel?" (Manuel was my dad's first name.)
"My kid brother. He's six," disclosed Carlos in all truthfulness.


And the errors just kept mounting with the reporter scribbling away.


Well, thankfully, the the San Francisco Examiner got our names right, although it still manage to exaggerate our plight (for color I suppose). We weren't made homeless. Our family lived in that house another thirty four years.


Enter Aunt Toy.


What a shock it must have been for her, coming straight from Los Angeles that morning, to find upon her approach, a terrible sight: a roiling column of smoke was now designating our home's location on the cityscape as the exterior of our residence was slowly being engulfed.


Yet worse than the fire for me, was my being smothered by Tia Toy's demonstrative hugs!


I could go on about a possible arson angle (remember this was the second fire in a forte night to hit our building). At the time, someone was pushing to buy up four properties (two residences and two businesses). The two residences were the hold outs, and both were homes were damaged.


Or I could focus on the firefight, which was also very urgent. For not only did they have the roofing company to contend with on the one side of our house, but a gas station on the other with its used motor oil pit and underground gas tanks. A "blevy" (Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion) directly across from the San Francisco General Hospital is all the fire units would need!


Well, the crews did a valiant job.The fire was stopped short of the gas station - just barely. And as bad as it looked, our house was actually spared total destruction. The roofing company, with a history of suspicious fires, was not. It was completely gutted.


Respectively, the story made page 4 and page 6 of the Monday, August 24th, 1964 edition of the Chronicle and the Examiner.


Now, if your wondering what I may be thinking in the Chronicle photograph as I dearly hold onto my tiger Toni, (apart from our family losing our home) I am also thinking of my other "prized possession" that didn't get rescued by my sis, my little black toy ewe named "Lammie".


This is how I confabulate the day forty seven years ago today, and all I am relying upon is my tattered mental notes.