In Memory of Debra Crowe McArthur

Posted on September 20, 2026Leave a comment

Today, I want to remember and honor a beautiful young woman named Debra Crowe McArthur.

Debra was a new bride and the mother of a baby daughter, Tenika Mason. Tragically, on April 19, 1976, Debra lost her life in a car accident while she was on her way to school. She was only seventeen years old.

Because Tenika was just a baby when her mother passed away, she never had the opportunity to truly know her or share the precious memories that every daughter deserves to have with her mother. She has come to know Debra through photographs, family stories, and the love her mother left behind.

Tenika wants her mother to be remembered—not simply as a name and two dates, but as a beautiful young woman, a daughter, a new bride, and a loving mother whose life ended far too soon.

I am sharing Debra’s photograph and story today so that her beautiful face and memory will continue to live on. Although her time on this earth was brief, she will always be loved, deeply missed, and forever remembered by her daughter, family and friends.

Debra Crowe McArthur
May 25, 1958 – April 19, 1976

Shared in loving memory for her daughter,
Tenika Mason

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Three Wars in One Photograph

Posted on September 20, 2026Leave a comment

William “Uncle Bill” Morgan demonstrates a muzzleloader to Glade Dyer at left, Claude Keith standing, and Bill Kaylor at right in the 1948 photograph.( Dean Wilson Collection)

Looking Back at Uncle Bill Morgan and Three Generations of Veterans

When I look at this 1948 photograph today, I see much more than four men gathered around an old muzzleloader. I see veterans representing three different American wars and nearly a century of military history brought together in one room.

The elderly gentleman seated in the center is William Nelson “Uncle Bill” Morgan of Dayton, Tennessee. The man seated to his left is Glade Dyer, a World War II veteran. Standing behind Morgan is Claude Keith, a World War I veteran. Seated on the right is Bill Kaylor, a World War II Navy veteran.

In the photograph, Uncle Bill is showing the younger veterans how to handle a muzzleloading firearm. The original news clipping caption identified him as Tennessee’s only living Civil War veteran and said this was the muzzleloader he had carried as a Union soldier.

The newspaper caption connected the firearm with the year 1861, but Morgan’s official military record gives a later date. His government headstone application shows that he enlisted on August 20, 1864. For that reason, I cannot say with certainty that he carried this particular muzzleloader in 1861. It may have been connected to experiences before his formal enlistment, or the 1861 date may have been a mistake in the newspaper caption.

According to the official headstone application, Morgan served as a private in Company B of the 7th Regiment Tennessee Mounted Infantry Volunteers. It was a Union regiment recruited during the latter part of 1864 from Anderson, Knox, Campbell, McMinn, Meigs and Monroe counties.

The regiment was commanded by Colonel James T. Shelley, Lieutenant Colonel James J. Dail and Major Oliver M. Dodson. It was organized at Athens, Tennessee, and remained stationed there during much of its service. The soldiers were used to pursue guerrilla forces and reportedly had frequent engagements with them.

The regiment’s general muster-in date was August 1, 1864, while Morgan’s individual enlistment date was August 20. He was discharged on June 27, 1865, and the regiment was officially mustered out under orders from the War Department on July 27, 1865.

Morgan was about 19 years old when he enlisted and 20 when he was discharged. He returned to civilian life and eventually became a farmer in the Dayton area.

His Tennessee death certificate provides a more personal look at the man in the photograph. It gives his full name as William Nelson Morgan and records that he was born on October 15, 1844, in Knox, Tennessee. His father was John Morgan, and his mother was Susan King Morgan.

The certificate identifies him as a married man, a retired farmer and a Civil War veteran. His wife was Zilpha Morgan, who was 88 years old at the time. She also provided the personal information used to complete his death certificate.

Morgan died in Dayton’s Civil District 3 on October 17, 1948. His usual residence was also in Dayton. He had turned 104 only two days earlier. His recorded causes of death were chronic myocarditis and senility.

Morgan was buried on October 20, 1948, in Buttram Cemetery in Dayton. His grave is located in Section 2, Grave 10. R.J. Coulter of Coulter Funeral Home of Dayton handled the arrangements.

At first, Morgan’s grave apparently did not have a permanent government marker. On December 28, 1948, Charles G. Morgan of Dayton submitted an official application requesting a flat granite marker with a Christian emblem. The application recorded Morgan’s Union service, rank, unit, enlistment and discharge dates, and burial in Buttram Cemetery. The marker was ordered from Columbus, Mississippi, and the application contains a February 1949 processing or shipping notation.

Looking at this photograph today, I am struck by the amount of history represented by these four men. Uncle Bill Morgan carried the memory of the Civil War. Claude Keith represented the generation that served in World War I. Glade Dyer and Bill Kaylor represented the men who had recently returned from World War II.

The photograph connects the Civil War era of the 1860s with the end of World War II in 1945. It was taken during the final year of Uncle Bill Morgan’s life and became one of his last public photographs. Today, the photograph, death certificate and military marker application allow us to put a name, a military record and a personal history with the elderly Union veteran seated at the center.

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Brenda Joan Seal — 1967 Tennessee Strawberry Festival Queen

Posted on September 7, 20261 Comment

(Brenda Joan Seal on the Dayton Tennessee Chamber of Commerce parade float for the year 1968. Photo By Bob Ivory)

From Tennessee Strawberry Festival Queen to Miss Tennessee and the Miss America Stage

Brenda Joan Seal, later known as Brenda Seal Kemp, was crowned Queen of the Tennessee Strawberry Festival in 1967, beginning a remarkable journey that would soon take the young Kingsport woman from the Strawberry Festival stage to the Miss America Pageant and into a recording studio.

The Tennessee Strawberry Festival had been a Dayton and Rhea County tradition since 1947, originally created to celebrate the county’s important strawberry-growing industry. Over the years, the festival’s parades, community celebrations and annual selection of a Strawberry Queen became an important part of local history.

In 1967, that crown belonged to Brenda Joan Seal.

Her place in Strawberry Festival history was formally recognized decades later by the Tennessee General Assembly. In a 2005 resolution honoring the festival and its former queens, state lawmakers specifically identified “Brenda Joan Seal Kemp (’67),” firmly documenting Brenda as the 1967 Tennessee Strawberry Festival Queen.

The Strawberry Festival crown proved to be only the beginning.

Representing East Tennessee State University, Brenda went on to become Miss Tennessee 1968. At just 19 years old, she represented the state at the Miss America Pageant in Atlantic City and advanced to the Top 10 finalists.

Brenda’s singing talent also opened the door to a recording career. In January 1969, Billboard reported that she had signed a recording contract with Singcord Corporation, associated with Zondervan Publishing House, to record an album featuring ten of America’s best-known religious hymns, including “Amazing Grace” and “The Old Rugged Cross.”

By March 1969, Record World reported that Brenda had completed her first album. The hymns had been selected through a nationwide survey of 100,000 homes.

A July 1, 1969 article in The Jackson Sun provides even more information about her recording career. The newspaper reported that the 20-year-old Miss Tennessee had an album out entitled Miss Tennessee—Brenda Seals Sings America’s Top 10 Religious Hymns.

At the time, Brenda was also recording additional music at Sound City Inc. in Jackson, Tennessee. According to the newspaper, she recorded a song titled “Life, I Love You” and was scheduled to return the following day to record another song, “White Lace.”

Brenda was accompanied to the recording session by Jack Smythe, president of the Miss Tennessee Pageant and her business manager. She was scheduled to return to Jackson on July 19 to crown the new Miss Tennessee, bringing her own year as the state’s titleholder to a close.

Her involvement in entertainment continued. Later in 1969, Brenda was also reported to be appearing in a Nashville musical and fashion production.

Yet for those interested in the history of Dayton and Rhea County, Brenda Joan Seal’s story has a particularly special beginning.

Before Miss Tennessee, before becoming a Top 10 Miss America finalist, and before making a record album, she was the young woman chosen to represent one of Rhea County’s most beloved traditions:

Brenda Joan Seal
1967 Tennessee Strawberry Festival Queen

Her photograph preserves the image of a Strawberry Queen whose story extended far beyond the festival grounds—a young Tennessee woman whose journey carried her from Dayton and the Strawberry Festival crown to the Miss Tennessee title, the Miss America stage and a recording career.

Where She Is Today

Brenda later became known as Brenda Seal Kemp and married Brantley Kemp. After the pageants and recording years, she largely stepped away from the public spotlight.

Family records provide a more recent glimpse into her life. When her brother Wayne Luke Seal died in 2022, Brenda Seal Kemp and her husband Brantley were listed among his surviving family members. In June 2024, Brenda and Brantley were again named among the surviving family in the obituary of Brenda’s sister, Marjorie Seal Wiles.

No reliable obituary or death record for Brenda has been located after that time. Therefore, the most recent information presently available indicates that Brenda Joan Seal Kemp was still living in 2024.

More than half a century after she wore the crown in Dayton, Brenda Joan Seal Kemp remains part of the history of the Tennessee Strawberry Festival. Her story is a reminder that for one young woman in 1967, the Strawberry Festival crown was not the end of an accomplishment—it was the beginning of an extraordinary journey.

Photo: Brenda Joan Seal, 1967 Tennessee Strawberry Festival Queen.

Nancy Burkhalter Band Director Remembered

Posted on August 23, 20262 Comments

Rhea Central Elementary School Band Director Touched the Lives of Her Students

Former band students remember Nancy Burkhalter from her years at Rhea Central Elementary School in Dayton, Tennessee, where she was their band director and music teacher. Looking back now, it is clear that the part of her life they knew at Rhea Central was only one chapter in a much larger and rather remarkable story. I recently came across her obituary following her death on June 18, 2026, at the age of 78, and it led me to learn much more about the woman many former students simply knew as Mrs. Burkhalter.

Nancy Anna Burkhalter was born October 2, 1947, the daughter of Roy Greenwood Burkhalter Jr. and Lois Lee Brooks Burkhalter. Music was much more than a subject she taught. She was a highly trained musician who earned master’s degrees in Music and Music Education from the University of South Carolina and continued her musical studies at the Royal Academy of Music in London. She was also an accomplished flutist and performed as a flutist and soloist with the Columbia Philharmonic Orchestra.

For approximately the first 15 years of her professional life, Nancy worked as a musician and educator. Her teaching career included Bryan College and the University of Tennessee, along with schools in Richland and Lexington counties in South Carolina. Somewhere within those years was the chapter that brought her to Dayton and Rhea Central.

The 1980 Rhea Central Elementary School yearbook includes Nancy’s photograph and lists her among the faculty, providing direct documentation that she was at Rhea Central during the 1979–1980 school year. Former band students remember her as the school’s band director and music teacher, with recollections placing her at Rhea Central from around the mid-1970s into the early 1980s. Her exact first and last years at the school have not yet been documented, so those dates remain approximate.

What I found especially interesting was what Nancy did after her career in music and education. At some point she began volunteering at the Columbia Free Medical Clinic, and that experience apparently changed the direction of her professional life. She returned to school, entered the field of pharmacy and earned a Doctor of Clinical Pharmacy degree. She eventually became an internationally recognized Certified Diabetes Educator.

Her work in medicine went far beyond what her former students might have imagined from knowing her as their band director. According to the information published about her life, the Department of Defense selected Nancy as one of only 24 international specialists involved in developing diabetes-care protocols for the U.S. Army. She developed what was known as the “Three Legged Stool” model for diabetes treatment, which became part of military diabetes guidelines. Her work also extended to asthma education, with programs she developed being adopted by the U.S. Army Surgeon General. She went on to lecture at national nursing conferences, Department of Defense Joint Forces Pharmacy seminars and other professional medical meetings.

Nancy received considerable recognition for this work. Among her honors were four U.S. Army Coins of Recognition, including Challenge and Commander’s Coins of Excellence. She also received the 1999 Ralph D. Arnold Army Pharmacy Award – Mel Liter Army Pharmacy Clinical Pharmacists Award, an award for Excellence in Pharmacy Administration in 1993, and the top award in a national “Design A Drug” competition that same year.

There was also much more to Nancy than her professional accomplishments. She maintained a second home in Black Mountain, North Carolina, where she enjoyed working on the house and tending gardens of daylilies and peonies. After retiring, she traveled extensively, visiting places that included Italy, Turkey, Mexico, Europe and the Caribbean, as well as destinations throughout the United States.

Learning all of this gives a completely different perspective on someone remembered by generations of students from their school days. Back then, she was Mrs. Burkhalter, their band director at Rhea Central. Her students may not have known the full extent of her musical background, and they certainly could not have known that she would eventually leave music education for an entirely different career and make important contributions to pharmacy, diabetes education and military medicine.

That is one of the fascinating things about going back through old yearbooks and researching the people pictured in them. A single black-and-white faculty photograph captures only one moment in a person’s life. Nancy Burkhalter’s photograph in the 1980 Rhea Central yearbook preserves the woman her students knew at that particular time, while the story of what came before and after that photograph reveals just how remarkable her life and career became.

Sources: Dr. Nancy Anna Burkhalter obituary, Dignity Memorial/Dunbar Funeral Home, Columbia, South Carolina, 2026; Rhea Central Elementary School Yearbook, 1980, Faculty, p. 2, from the personal collection of Dean Wilson.

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Sweaters, Jobs and a Growing Dayton 1962

Posted on August 11, 2026

“You Can Bring These Sweaters to Dayton” was the headline accompanying this photograph published on February 1, 1962, during a time when Dayton was working hard to attract new industry and manufacturing jobs to the community. The sweaters pictured were products of a proposed new sweater factory that Dayton Chamber of Commerce officials hoped to bring to town.

According to the newspaper, bringing the new factory to Dayton depended upon approval of a $100,000 Industrial Building Revenue Bond proposal that was to be voted on that Thursday. If the project moved forward, the company expected to have the factory in production by late summer and employ nearly 100 people. For a community the size of Dayton in 1962, a hundred new manufacturing jobs would have represented a significant addition to the local economy.

Textile manufacturing was already an important part of Dayton’s industrial picture. Kayser-Roth operated a hosiery plant in Dayton, manufacturing men’s and women’s hosiery. The operation would eventually employ more than 500 people, demonstrating just how important textile manufacturing became to the area.

Modeling the products were, from left to right, Gayle West, Jerry Young, and Becky Moore, with the photograph taken by Jim Cunnyngham.

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Rhea Hospital’s Nyla Cauthern

Posted on August 9, 2026

Nyla Cauthern — Looking Back to 1958

On February 2, 1958, nurse-anesthetist Nyla Cauthern put on her crisp, starched uniform and prepared to welcome the public to the newly opened Rhea County Hospital. She was among the hospital’s first employees and helped put the finishing touches on the facility before its doors opened. For Rhea County, the new hospital represented an important milestone—before it was built, residents often had to travel outside the county for medical treatment, and babies were still commonly delivered at home.

The original hospital was modest by today’s standards: a 24,000-square-foot building with 39 inpatient beds, an emergency room, two operating rooms, X-ray and laboratory facilities, and eight bassinets in the delivery room. Cauthern worked as both a nurse and anesthetist and remembered the hospital as a small, close-knit place where the staff delivered babies, performed surgeries, and cared for their neighbors. Nearly half a century later, she could still remember her very first surgical patient—a mechanic from a local automobile dealership whom she recalled with great fondness.

After leaving Rhea County for a time to live in Georgia and raise a family, Cauthern eventually returned to the area and continued working in nursing. Looking back on those early days, she described helping open Rhea County Hospital in 1958 as “one of the most rewarding experiences” of her life. Her memories provide a personal glimpse into a very different era of medicine and into the beginnings of hospital care in Rhea County.

Read the Complete History of Rhea County Hospital

To learn more about the story of Rhea County Hospital—from the years of planning that began after World War II, through its opening in 1958 and the many years that followed—read the complete history on Yesterday in Dayton:

Remembering Rhea County Hospital — Yesterday in Dayton

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Sale Creek Man Injured in South Dayton Wreck 1957

Posted on July 12, 20261 Comment

This newspaper photograph, which was taken by Jimmy Cunnyngham, a Rhea Central High student at the time captures the aftermath of an automobile accident that occurred on a Sunday night in 1957, just south of Dayton, Tennessee. The wrecked vehicle belonged to John Robert Fuller, a 20-year-old resident of Sale Creek, who lost control of his car shortly after pulling onto the highway around 10:00 p.m.

According to newspaper accounts, the automobile left the roadway, plunged into a ditch, and sheared off a light pole before coming to rest in a mangled heap. Fuller was alone in the vehicle and suffered serious injuries, requiring hospitalization. The image, illuminated by emergency lights and surrounded by onlookers, serves as a stark reminder of an era when rural highways were often unforgiving and modern safety features such as seat belts, airbags, and energy-absorbing vehicles were still years away.

Today, more than six decades later, this photograph stands as more than just a record of a traffic accident. It is a preserved moment in local history—a testament to the dangers of mid-century travel, the response of a close-knit community, and the resilience of a young man who survived a crash that easily could have claimed his life.

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A Forgotten Tradition: Funeral Home Parking Meter Covers

Posted on June 30, 2026

Displayed in a glass case in the lobby of Coulter-Garrison Funeral Home is a purple velvet parking meter cover embroidered with the words “Reserved – Coulter Funeral Home.” While it may seem like an unusual keepsake today, it represents a time when downtown Dayton looked very different.

Years ago, when Coulter Funeral Home was located on First Avenue, parking meters lined the streets. Because funeral homes had little private parking, cities often allowed them to reserve metered spaces for funeral services. Specially made covers like this one were placed over parking meters to provide convenient parking for grieving families, clergy, pallbearers, and funeral vehicles. It was a simple but meaningful way communities showed respect during times of loss.

As Dayton changed, so did the funeral home. Coulter Funeral Home later merged with Garrison Funeral Home, becoming the Coulter-Garrison Funeral Home you know today on North Market Street. The downtown parking meters are now gone, replaced by modern streets and our spacious paved parking lot, making the old meter covers a thing of the past.

Today, this parking meter cover serves as more than a historical artifact. It is a reminder of our roots, our long history of serving Dayton families, and how funeral service has evolved while our commitment to compassion, dignity, and care has remained unchanged.

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Remembering Rhea County Hospital

Posted on June 29, 2026

Where Life's First Cry Was Heard, Hope Was Restored, and Final Goodbyes Were Gently Spoken

The movement to build a county hospital in Rhea County began shortly after World War II, around 1947, following the passage of the federal Hill-Burton Act. The legislation made state and federal assistance available for hospital construction and opened the way for rural communities such as Rhea County to pursue modern medical facilities. Public support in Rhea County was overwhelming. In the 1950 general county election, voters approved the proposal to build a hospital by a margin of approximately fifteen to one, with every precinct in the county voting in favor. That decisive vote demonstrated how strongly local citizens recognized the need for improved medical care close to home.

At the first meeting of the county court elected in 1954, a hospital planning committee was appointed, with C. P. Sawyers serving as chairman. Other members included Leonard Pack, George Barnard, M. E. Robines, and Jewel Smith. The following year, the Tennessee Legislature made additional funds available so the project could move forward under the Hill-Burton program. The committee worked closely with representatives of the County Council of Community Clubs and the Dayton Chamber of Commerce, meeting with state officials and determining that only one hospital for the county was economically feasible. Local representatives made repeated trips to the State Board of Health in Nashville to finalize plans and secure the necessary approvals.

As planning continued, several possible locations along U.S. Highway 27 were considered. Sites in the central part of the county were rejected because of inadequate water and sanitation. The eventual selection of the Morgan farm site was greatly aided by the City of Dayton, which agreed to extend water and sewer service to the property at no cost to the county, saving taxpayers an estimated $75,000. After the county court authorized $150,000 in hospital bonds, an additional $450,000 in matching state and federal funds was secured.

In June 1955, the site was approved and purchased from the Morgan family. Present at the sale were Archie McKinley Morgan Sr., Lloyd Austin Morgan, and Roy Edward Morgan, representing the family. Also attending were Jim Abel, Walter Cheers, George Barnard, and C. P. Sawyers. An architect was then hired, plans were completed and submitted through the proper agencies, bids were accepted, and ground was broken on September 4, 1956.

resized_img428 — Old Morgan Farm on the hill side prior to construction of the hospital. (Glass Family Collection)

When construction was completed, the new Rhea County Hospital was turned over to a nonpartisan board of trustees appointed by the county court to supervise its operation. The bond issue was scheduled to be retired over a ten-year period under the existing tax assessment. The hospital officially opened in February 1958 as a modern medical and surgical facility serving the people of Rhea County. The building contained 24,000 square feet of floor space and accommodation for 39 patients in private and semi-private rooms, with room for future expansion if needed.

These two photos are of the construction of the new Rhea County Hospital. Ground broke in the fall of 1956. These images were taken by local Dayton Photographer Bob Ivory.

At the time of its opening, the hospital represented a major advance in local health care. It featured an emergency treatment room with easy ambulance access, a minor operating room for procedures such as tonsillectomies, a separate oral surgery room, and a major operating room equipped for major surgical procedures. The operating suite was built on a conductive floor to eliminate static electricity and reduce the danger of explosion from anesthetic gases. Separate maternity facilities included two adjacent labor rooms. The hospital also offered modern X-ray and laboratory services, a medical library and conference room for physicians and officials, a hospitality shop for visitors, and a stainless-steel kitchen designed to prepare both regular and special diets for patients and staff.

Visiting hours were scheduled during three periods each day, with overnight visitors permitted only with the approval of the attending physician and hospital officials. The active medical staff at opening included Dr. Max Lindsay, Dr. A. C. Broyles, Dr. Conrad L. Graebel, Dr. James L. Mathis, Dr. J. J. Rodgers, and Dr. W. A. Thomison. Later historical accounts also recognized additional individuals who played important roles in planning the hospital, including Wilson Cash, Walter Cheers, Harry F. Fourman, Spencer Jones, and Jewel Smith, while continuing to identify C. Paxton Sawyers and George Barnard among the project's principal leaders.

Although the emergency room was considered modern when the hospital opened, by 1973 it had become clear that expanded facilities were needed. The original emergency room could accommodate only one patient at a time and had no waiting room for families or other patients. That same year marked the beginning of a broader period of expansion for the hospital. State records show that Rhea County Hospital filed a certificate-of-need project to add 30 hospital beds and undertake substantial expansion and relocation work at a cost of $1,646,300. To help finance the project, the hospital also received a $100,000 grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission.

In 1975, eighteen acute-care beds were converted to nursing home beds. By 1978, construction plans included a much larger emergency department. When the new emergency room opened in early 1979, it contained 1,134 square feet, could routinely accommodate five patients at a time, and featured a 560-square-foot waiting area, replacing the original 225-square-foot emergency room. During 1979, the hospital also added mobile nuclear medicine and chronic hemodialysis services, while a 60-bed nursing home addition was approved as part of the continuing expansion of medical care in the county.

The original Rhea County Hospital continued serving the county at its Morgan farm location for nearly fifty years. The facility, including its later additions, remained in operation until August 2007, when services were transferred to the new Rhea County Medical Center on Highway 27 north of the original site.

Following the opening of the new hospital, Life Care began using the former nursing home facility associated with the original hospital. That building remained in operation under Life Care for several years until the organization relocated to its new facility in 2012. After Life Care moved, the former hospital and nursing home complex stood vacant until plans moved forward for the construction of the new justice center.

This marked the final chapter in the site's long history as Rhea County's medical campus, transforming it from a place of healing into one serving an entirely different public purpose. Yet the property remains a place of memory, where countless lives began, where many found healing and comfort, and where others spent their final days. It stands as a lasting reminder of the patients who passed through its doors, the families who waited with hope and concern, and the physicians, nurses, and caregivers whose compassion touched generations of Rhea County residents.

Rhea Hospital 2016 — An aerial view of the old Hospital and Nursing Home a short white before it was demolished. (Photo by Dean Wilson)

Information Was Taken From Public Sources.

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Robinson Building Center

Posted on June 21, 2026

Pictured above is the Robinson Building Center prior to the fire. (Wilson Collection)

Looking Back: The Night Fire Destroyed Robinson Building Center in May 1982

More than four decades have passed since one of the most dramatic commercial fires in Dayton’s history lit up the night sky and brought firefighters from across the region rushing to help save what they could.

Late on the evening of May 19, 1982, flames erupted at the Robinson Building Center on Railroad Street at Hwy 30.45 Within minutes, the fire had engulfed the company’s main office building, producing a glow so intense that residents said it could be seen from as far away as the Frazer community.

Dayton Fire Department Engineer Dennis Kirby was among the first to arrive. Realizing the blaze had already gained too much headway, he immediately called for additional assistance.

Three Dayton fire trucks quickly went into action, pumping nearly 2,000 gallons of water per minute. Mutual aid departments from Spring City, Graysville and Sale Creek joined the battle, while Meigs County firefighters stood by in case another emergency occurred elsewhere. In all, about forty firefighters worked through the night to contain the inferno.

Fire Chief Jack Arnold later said the first priority was preventing the flames from spreading to the lumber yard and nearby homes, particularly the Buck Blye residence across the street. Firefighters directed streams of water onto the house for more than an hour, successfully keeping the blaze from reaching it.

By the height of the fire, the office building was beyond saving. Massive support beams burned and collapsed, creating a scene described by many witnesses as “nothing but flames.” By daylight, all that remained was a smoldering pile of rubble.

Despite the destruction, quick action by employees and volunteers helped prevent even greater losses. Workers from Robinson Building Center, along with personnel from John Beard Ford and Dyer’s Wrecker Service, managed to pull the company’s four delivery trucks away from danger. One man suffered burns when hot seat-cover material stuck to his back and legs, but the vehicles themselves were saved.

The fire also damaged telephone lines and utility equipment, leaving several nearby homes without power for hours while repairs were made.

Although the building itself had been lost, owner Alan Cawood was determined that the disaster would not put the business out of operation.

Speaking only days after the fire, Caywood announced that Robinson Building Center would reopen on Monday, May 24.

“We may have to write tickets on the hoods of trucks, but we’ll be here,” he said.

True to his words, the company resumed operations from temporary facilities while plans were made to rebuild. Materials continued to be delivered, and customers continued to be served as closely to normal as possible.

State Fire Marshal Ray Davis investigated the blaze, and witnesses reported that the fire appeared to have started near the rear of the building.

Today, the fire of May 1982 remains one of the most memorable incidents in Dayton’s history. While the office building was lost, the determination of employees, firefighters and the community ensured that Robinson Building Center survived the disaster and continued serving Rhea County.

For those who witnessed the fire firsthand, the sight of the flames towering into the night sky and the efforts of dozens of firefighters working tirelessly to save neighboring homes remain unforgettable memories more than forty years later.

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