The Black Forest Fire near Colorado Springs has killed at least two people and destroyed more homes than any other fire in Colorado history. Some 360 houses have burned. Hundreds of people have lost much of what they owned, if not everything. One of them is Richard Hoffmann. He says he got the bad news from his daughter.
The home Hoffmann and his wife helped build, lived in for 35 years, raised children in, and had plans of remodling, has burned to the ground, along with his garage and other out-buildings.
The retiree, after 30 years with the phone company, says he's in a kind of shock, but he plans to rebuild, in the same place. And he's got his memories.
He and his son were able to save some things - some pictures and family jewelry - but he had only seven or eight minutes to load a truck.
If he could go back now and save one more thing, it would be the 1962 Winnebago trailer he and his son were going to refurbish. And, he says, the old phone booth and telephone he had in his garage. He did, after all, work for the phone company.
Black Forest Fire, near Colorado Springs, CO, June 12, 2013 [Photo: CPR/BMarkus]
