The Author

Of the Stratford Hotel Fire of 1977

 

While passing through Riverside Cemetery not long ago, a pair of gravestones caught my attention because the date of death was the same on both-- 1977. I backed my car up to take a closer look and discovered that the name shared by both was the same - - Twedt: Beth and Tony Twedt.

A chill went through me, for I knew in an instant how those people met their fate: It was in that horrible Stratford Hotel fire which killed a number of people I knew on a sub-zero blizzarding January nite.

I knew them because, while a student at NDSSS during the summer of 1958, I had gotten a job as night clerk, working the 7 pm to 7 am shift. That job allowed me to become part of that fascinating community that made up the Stratford Hotel and Cafe. It was a very memorable season of my life.

My employer was a widow lady named Stead. She was quite elderly, very serious minded, and thorough in her instructions for me. She also had a very distinctive disability which forced her to wear about a three-inch lift on one of her shoes. She was very kind and considerate, and helped me very patiently as I struggled to master the switch-board connecting all the rooms and the outside world to the desk. Mrs Stead also gave me a free room to live in while I was there which helped me a lot.

The hotel lobby adjoined the Stratford Cafe, which was owned and managed by Beth and Tony Twedt, who became two of my very favorite people in the building. Every evening when I came to work, I would usually find them in the first booth on my left as I passed from the lobby into the cafe. Tony gave me a little good-natured ribbing about the pink knees that peeked out from under my Bermuda shorts, and I had a punning field day with the name 'Twedt, which was fun for a kid just in off the stweet. But the thing I most remember from that first meeting was how he kindly told me I could raid his walk-in cooler if I got hungry in the middle of the night.

I'll tell you my friend, that cold turkey or roast beef or ham was gourmet food for a guy living on day-old bread, 10 cent baked potatoes and tap-water instant coffee.

“And the evening and the morning were the first day” of work. And in the morning Tony offered me a free breakfast. He seemed to have a heart for kids working their way through college. Whatever his motivation, he was a real friend in need back in those formative days.

A number of other hotel regulars caught my attention as well. A trucker named Jerry Lehman sported a cowboy hat and boots and a long wallet hooked to a chain. Jerry Reed of “Smoky and the Bandit” fame looked a lot like him. Lehman was in the cafe a lot courting a pretty waitress working there whom he later married. Also Jerry's aunt, Grace Lehman, became sort of my dorm mother—waking me up often with her mop-bucket and cheery good mornings. And her brother Hank, drove the Wildcat bus to all of the away games and Melodic Caravan shows I was part of.

Also there were the traveling salesmen, many of whom tried to sell me stuff, putting on demos right in the late-nite hotel lobby. One, Knute Nastad from Northwood, persuaded me to sell Kirby vacuums for him. That became a huge source of income for me later.

The hotel lobby was a real hang-out for all kinds of people. The railroad employees came in regularly. as did passengers coming and going on both the Great Northern and the Greyhound lines. Many of the live-in residents came down and sat about the lobby just as if it was their living room. One unforgettable old guy often showed up very late at nite. Jake, I think was his name. He looked like he had been sleeping in a coal bin. He had a smoker's hack you could feel in the pit of your stomach. He usually came in, bought cigarets, grumbled something nasty, and then coughed, spit in the cuspidor, and left. The place was a people watcher's paradise, and I saw it as the hub for both of the twin towns. I later appreciated movies like “Grand Hotel” more because of that job.

I mentioned in an earlier column how I met my telephone-operator wife over the switchboard there, and later when we were established as residents of Wahpeton, we came to the Stratford Cafe often for ice cream sundaes or late nite breakfasts after nites on the town.

And then came that bone-chilling minus 20 January night of 1977 when all the sirens sounded at once and fire engines and men from all the surrounding towns converged on Breckenridge at the Stratford Hotel. But it was all to no avail. The conflagration was literally devastating, and very few of the residents there made it out. One of our English Dept. teachers had signed up to stay there that night, but thanks to an invitation by a friend, Art Boss, from Underwood, Minn. escaped a horrible death.

But Beth and Tony and Mrs. Stead, and many others didn't make it out. The memory of that great tragedy still gives me solemn pause. Yet I feel deep down that I may well see many of those great people again,and it may not be long from now at all. How does that great old spiritual “Deep River” end? “It's not far/ Just close by/ Through an open door.”

Gene Pinkney: For the Daily News - Oct. 5th, 2020

edited html update 08-23-2021

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