Night of Fire	Night of Fire
Day of Fire	Day of Fire	Day After Fire	Day After Fire

Hundreds watch firefighters battle to save piece of history

By Bret Putnam, STAFF WRITER

HALF MOON BAY -- A fire tore through the Cunha Country Store Wednesday evening, destroying this city's most prominent historic landmark and depriving its citizens of a cherished centerpiece of civic life.

Residents young and old fought back tears as they gathered by the hundreds on downtown streets to watch firefighters do battle, as the century-old building burned from late afternoon into the night.

"Cunha's is the jewel of Half Moon Bay," said Bob Lacey, a director of the local Pumpkin Festival. "It's definitely the end of an era. That's why you see people crying because a building has burned down. In all the years I've been here, that's the saddest thing I've seen."

The fire was reported at about 5:30 p.m., said Half Moon Bay Fire Chief Jim Asche, and the first fire engine arrived within a minute. Fire officials called second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth alarms in rapid succession, summoning at least 20 fire trucks and 80 firefighters from across San Mateo County.

Officials weren't able to pinpoint a cause of the fire Wednesday night, but Asche noted that a work crew had applied tar to the building's roof in the afternoon, and that may have been a factor. The two-story building was a wood frame structure, Asche said, and had no sprinkler system. The store's employees all escaped the fire, and no one was hurt.
For miles around Wednesday afternoon, great billowing columns of smoke, alternatively white, grey and black, could be seen rising in the sky above Half Moon Bay and drifting east over the coastal hills.

In town, fire trucks crowded the streets, their ladders rising high above the rooftops. Firefighters directed hoses at Cunha's from all directions, and water spilled from the building and cascaded through the streets while the acrid stench of smoke clung to the nostrils.

At 7:33 p.m., flames broke through the building's roof for the first time. At 8:25 p.m., the southern wall of Cunha's came crashing down onto Kelly Street, with a massive percussive bang.

The store's owner, Bev Cunha Ashcraft, who was in the building when the fire started, has worked at the store for almost six decades. Her father, William Cunha, opened the store at 448 Main St. 80 years ago.

Ashcraft is a central figure in Half Moon Bay -- extending credit to customers, urging local farmers to keep her well-supplied with vegetables and flowers, and taking a leading role in local affairs.

"She's loved by everybody," said Steve Wilson, who serves with Ashcraft on the board of the Coastside Family Medical Clinic. "So this touches everybody very deeply, to see this kind of loss."

In a parking lot just south of the Cunha's, Ashcraft watched her store burn. She was too heartbroken to talk about the fire, but was approached by a steady stream of friends who offered hugs and condolences.

"This community is going to rally around her, I can tell you that," said John Muller, a local pumpkin farmer.
The building that housed Cunha's dates back to the turn of the last century, and originally was home to a saloon as well as a general store and an upstairs performance hall.

More recently, the grocery store, a delicatessen and a butcher shop, were on the ground floor, while Western clothing and dry goods were sold on the second floor, which also contained offices. An attached warehouse was also on the ground level.

On Wednesday as the fire raged, townspeople reminisced about trips to the store they took as children, about the fine quality of the meat in the butcher shop, about how Ashcraft would run a tab for them, about when their parents took them upstairs to buy their first pair of jeans. And they thought about how life in Half Moon Bay had been irrevocably changed in one tragic day.

"This is like losing a friend, I'll tell you," said Half Moon Bay resident Buzz Meyers.
You can reach staff writer Bret Putnam at 348-4330 or by e-mail at bputna@angnewspapers.com .

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Fire destroys historic country store
Cunha's market was in the heart of Half Moon Bay

Suzanne Herel, Carl Nolte, Chronicle Staff Writers

Thursday, May 22, 2003 (Large Photo)

The Cunha Country Store, a landmark that stood at the heart of rural Half Moon Bay for more than a century, was destroyed in a six-alarm fire that lit up the San Mateo County coast Wednesday night.

By the time firefighters got to the scene, the building was totally engulfed in flames. The blaze burned furiously for four hours with a pillar of fire and smoke that could be seen and smelled for miles.
The two-story wooden building housed one of the Bay Area's last original general stores, which sold everything from cowboy boots to local produce. It was a bit of Americana celebrated in tourist guidebooks and beloved by generations of local residents.

"There are a lifetime of memories there. It was the cornerstone of Half Moon Bay," said Chris Mikelsen, who was raised in town and first went into the store with his grandfather.

Wednesday night, Mikelsen's children, Annaliese, 9, and Ridge, 7, stood on Main Street and watched the store burn. Annaliese had tears in her eyes. They always treated little girls nicely in the Cunha store, she said. She liked the ice cream.

The fire started between 5 and 6 p.m., apparently in a shed in the rear of the store, said Half Moon Bay Fire Chief James Asche, and quickly spread.

"Those old buildings are built to burn," Asche said.

Firefighters continued through the night to soak down hot spots in the building. There were no reports of injuries.
It was the biggest fire on the coastside in years, and fire crews and equipment from Daly City, Hillsborough, Pacifica, San Mateo and the county fire department were called in -- nearly 100 firefighters and 25 trucks and engines.

It was such a huge response that Highway 92 leading from the central Peninsula was closed to all but emergency vehicles.

At first, it was feared that the fire would spread to the other old wooden buildings that make up Half Moon Bay's old downtown.

Joe Cotchett, a Burlingame lawyer who owns half a dozen other buildings in the center of town, said at first he feared the Cunha fire would destroy all of downtown. "This could be a major disaster for the Bay Area," Cotchett said.

The Cunha store was the only loss, but that was bad enough.

"It's the heart of Half Moon Bay," said Cotchett, "And Half Moon Bay is the heart of the coastside."
The building had many lives. During prohibition it was a speakeasy, and in another time, the second floor housed an auditorium where political meetings and live theater were held.

Beverly Cunha Ashcraft, whose family has owned the Cunha store for more than 70 years, watched it burn. She was wearing her trademark large eyeglasses trimmed with rhinestones, but she was too upset to talk about the fire.
"It has to be a huge emotional loss for Bev," said Cotchett, who also wrote a book about the old downtown. He has called Half Moon Bay's Main Street "almost a time warp . . . it's not unlike where we all grew up, small, friendly, owner-occupied stores."

Half Moon Bay was originally settled by Portuguese fishermen from the Azores and by Italian families, and until recent real estate booms it was a small, family-oriented town where the residents had deep roots.
The four-block downtown's old buildings, dating back over 130 years, retained the charm of another era. In recent years, tourists flocked to Half Moon Bay and in 2001, a 261-room Ritz Carlton Hotel opened on the bluffs overlooking the ocean.

A new golf course opened that spring, and in 2000 the town's first million- dollar home was sold. There are now about 8,000 residents.

Development and change were resisted by some residents. The biggest previous fire on the coast happened about 10 years ago when a new tourist hotel burned down in a blaze that turned out to be arson.
It appeared that arson was not involved in the Cunha fire. Asche thought it might have had something to do with a roofing project in an adjacent shed, but the cause was still under investigation Wednesday night.

Firefighters could give no dollar estimate of the damage.

E-mail the writers at sherel@sfchronicle.com and cnolte@sfchronicle.com.

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Bay Area News Roundup
Local news all the time

Bay City News Report
Thursday, May 22, 2003

(05-22) 11:42 PST -- Half Moon Bay residents are saying goodbye today to an historic downtown general store destroyed Wednesday in a six-alarm fire.

According to Half Moon Bay Fire Chief Jim Asche, the fire broke out around 6 p.m. in an adjoining warehouse on the northwest corner of the market at 448 Main St.

The fire burned until about 9:30 p.m., but Asche said the rubble is still smoking, and he expects crews to be clearing the debris for the remainder of the day.

Damage to the building itself is estimated to cost more than $3 million, but estimating the value of inventory, which included everything from collectibles and dry goods to specialty cuts of meat, may take some time.
Though the debris may be gone by tomorrow, the emotional toll of the fire will linger for a long time to come.
Asche, a 16-year Half Moon Bay resident, said the fire has caused inestimable damage to the community.
"It's a tight community, and this place was a big part of it,'' he said.

The owners of the store are devastated, and though they had fire insurance they have not yet decided whether to rebuild the store, Asche said.

Concerned community members have already established a trust fund for the store's owners at First National Bank in Half Moon Bay, and are planning events to raise more funds for the trust. Asche said investigators are close to determining the cause of the fire, and will likely release that later today. No physical injuries to civilians or firefighters were reported.