KNOX — History went up in smoke Thursday when a landmark barn on the Berne-Altamont Road burned in a lightning storm.

Hilltown fire departments responded to the call and fought the flames in the afternoon, then returned to the scene later after the fire had rekindled. Only remnants of the barn remained.
"That was a beautiful barn," said John Kolanchick, who owned the barn and neighboring house for nearly 40 years. Kolanchick now lives in a house nearby. "If I was living there, I would have lost a heck of a lot of stuff," he said. "It was dry, and boy, she went up like a candle."
"It went up fast," agreed Bill Vinson, chief of the Knox Volunteer Fire Department.

Firefighters battled the blaze from 3 to 6 p.m. after Kolanchick sounded the alarm. When they arrived at 3 p.m., all that remained were the beams, said Vinson. Before leaving the scene around 6 p.m., firefighters covered the remnants of the barn with foam. There wasn’t a puff of smoke showing, Vinson said. But they had to return because the fire had rekindled. Rain, Vinson said, had washed the foam away.
The Knox firefighters arrived back at the firehouse and were cleaning their hoses and equipment, but were called to the barn about 8 p.m. They were at the scene for about one-and-a-half hours "hitting the hot spots" and were back in service around 10 p.m., Vinson said.

Though the barn and the house are approximately 150 feet apart, the intense heat of the fire melted the vinyl siding of the house, said Vinson. Firefighters inspected the interior of the house, and determined the damage was entirely exterior, he said.

It would be difficult to say whether a tall pine tree next to the barn or the barn itself was first struck by lightning, said Vinson. The cause of the fire, he said, was either the debris from the tree that had been struck or the lightning traveling through roots underneath the barn, Vinson said.
The Berne Volunteer Fire Company, also at the scene, "provided mutual aid," with manpower and a tanker, said its president, Alan Zuk.

According to Kolanchick and Richard W. Griessel, whose family lived on the property from 1929 to 1960, the barn was approximately 100 years old.

The barn, house, and property is owned by Shon and Leslie McLain of Saratoga Springs (Saratoga County), who could not be reached for comment.

History

Griessel traced the history of the property and the barn. His father, Albert F. Griessel, bought the house, a vacationing spot, from Charles and Minnie Weaver in 1929.
While the Weavers owned the home, it was known as the Point View House. At the beginning of the 20th Century, tourists came by train from Albany to the Altamont station. After arriving, they were transported to the house by Mr. Weaver. He picked up guests with a horse-drawn buggy in the summers and with a bobsled in the winters. "No one called it a bed and breakfast. They called it a guest house," Greissel said.
After buying the property from the Weavers, Greissel’s father renamed the property Point View Farm. He said he remembered his father painting over the "House."

He also recalled the troubles motorists had climbing the steep hill to Knox.
"You can’t believe the cars. They’d just barely make the Hill. Time and time again, we’d fill them," he said, explaining the radiators needed fluid.

Griessel recalled mowing the property. Every third time his family mowed the lawn, he took large rocks, which formed a border around the barn, and set them aside to mow under them. After mowing, he put them back in place.
"Your back was breaking when you were done," he said. "I have a lot of memories of that barn."

Kolanchick stored his boat, hay, and animals in the barn. A Scout leader, he also stored camping equipment in the barn. The property, he said, probably sold for about $1,400 in the 1800’s. It was once a sugar bush; the former owners grew potatoes and made maple syrup, he said.

Kolanchick and Griessel recalled the barn’s pulley system, used to hoist loose hay into the rafters. Large tongs, attached to a rope on a pulley, would grab the hay and then it was moved to the top of the barn, said Kolanchick.
"It was certainly in fine condition when my folks bought it in 1929," Griessel said of the historic barn. He recalled multiple times he’d painted it, and the difficulty of painting its eastern side, which towered higher than its other sides.
"I painted that barn more than I can remember," he said.