CENTERBURG — A recent vintage postcard discovery shows us some smoking ruins in Centerburg in August of 1909.
Photographers of the period liked to catch public events such as fires and floods and offer postcards of their pictures to potential buyers who wanted to tell friends or relatives about the excitement.
What the photographer of this image — whose name was not noted — probably did not realize at the time was that he (or she) was recording a crime scene in this shot. It was an interesting enough photo that someone bought this postcard, though the lack of address on the back suggests that it was never sent.
As reported in the History Knox article The Foster Gang: Centerburg’s burglary and arson ring from May 2019, the southwestern Knox County town was plagued in the early 1900s by a series of unsolved crimes involving theft and fire.
The specific fire which happened on Sunday, Aug. 29, was such a large conflagration, locals were afraid for a time that it would spread and burn down the entire town. After fighting the blaze for several hours with pumps, chemicals, and a citizen’s bucket brigade, the fire was brought under control about 2:30 a.m.
The charred remains of buildings recorded in this photo taken soon after the fire included Miller & Tuttle’s Dry Goods, Elmer Utlack’s hardware store, Dr. A. W. Brown’s dentistry office, and the Oddfellow’s Lodge, which included the office of the City Telephone Exchange, which had moved there after a previous suspicious fire destroyed its office on the other side of the square!
It was fully half of the buildings on the Centerburg town square.
After further thefts and fires, it was determined in 1911 that the arson incidents were covers for the robberies committed by the Foster Gang and its associates, which included a corrupt constable.
Convicted, gang members were sent to prison, but continued their criminal lives later on, earning return visits to the state penitentiary.
