10/02/2026
***FLASHBACK FRIDAY — ACROSS THE TOWN LINE***
For generations, the history of Reliance Hose Company No. 1 has extended beyond the boundaries of Phillipsburg. When neighboring communities needed additional manpower, apparatus, or specialized resources, Phillipsburg’s fire companies were often among those called to assist. Few places illustrate that relationship better than neighboring Lopatcong Township and the Delaware Park area.
Just beyond the Phillipsburg town line, Delaware Park has been the scene of residential, commercial, industrial, and institutional fires that brought Reliance and the other Phillipsburg companies across the municipal boundary to work alongside their neighboring firefighters. Some became major regional alarms involving companies from throughout Warren County and beyond. Others were controlled before they could develop into the kind of devastating fires remembered for generations. For this Flashback Friday, we look back at several documented occasions when Reliance answered that call.
The stories span 85 years, from 1941 to 2026, beginning with a three-family apartment fire in Delaware Park and continuing through the destruction of the Hillcrest Club, two major fires only weeks apart in 1987, the fire that heavily damaged the Key City Diner, and a recent apartment fire at Brakeley Gardens. These are not intended to represent every occasion Reliance responded into Lopatcong Township. Countless alarms and requests for assistance have occurred over the years without finding their way into the newspapers or historical records available today. Instead, these incidents provide snapshots from different generations, showing how that mutual-aid relationship developed and continued over time.
The equipment changed. Fireground tactics evolved. Buildings and landmarks disappeared, while others were rebuilt and given another chapter. Even Reliance’s role at these incidents varied. What remained consistent was the willingness to cross the town line when assistance was requested. From the Delaware Park apartment fire of 1941 to Brakeley Gardens in 2026, the following stories represent more than eight decades of Reliance Hose Company answering mutual-aid calls into neighboring Lopatcong Township. Another part of the company’s history when others could Rely on Reliance.
*** March 18, 1941 — Delaware Park Apartment Fire***
On the morning of March 18, 1941, the destination was nearby Delaware Park in Lopatcong Township, where a serious apartment fire brought all six Phillipsburg fire companies to the scene. The first alarm sounded at approximately 10:20 a.m. for a fire at 143 Park Avenue, where flames were spreading through a two-story apartment building occupied by three families. The fire was believed to have originated around a defective chimney in one of the first-floor apartments.
As conditions worsened, all six Phillipsburg fire companies responded into Lopatcong Township. For Reliance, it was another mutual aid run beyond its home municipality, this time only a short distance from Phillipsburg. Chilly weather complicated the work of the firemen as they fought to bring the blaze under control. Despite their efforts, the building was destroyed, with the total loss estimated at approximately $12,000.
The greatest impact was felt by the three families who called the building home. Nearly all of their possessions were lost. Percy Castner, who owned the building, lived there with his family and reported afterward that insurance would cover only a portion of his loss. Edward Rodenbough and his family also occupied the building, as did Richard Wilson and his family. The Wilsons had only recently made the apartment their home. They had moved there in February, about a month before the fire, and Wilson had purchased new furniture for the family. The fire destroyed those belongings, with his losses not fully covered by insurance. By the time the fire was over, three families had been driven from their homes and the two-story building had been lost.
Source: The Morning Call, Allentown, Pennsylvania, March 1941.
***March 9, 1966 — The Hillcrest Club Fire***
For nearly half a century, the Hillcrest Club stood on the high bluff above the North End of Phillipsburg, overlooking the flats and the industrial landscape surrounding the J.T. Baker Chemical plant below. Although the clubhouse itself stood on the Phillipsburg side of the municipal line, its location along the ridge closely associated it with neighboring Delaware Park. Built by the Ingersoll-Rand Company in 1918, the sprawling white frame clubhouse served as a social and recreational center for company employees and their families. It was designed by George Morgenstern of Easton, an Ingersoll-Rand employee, and enlarged with an addition in 1929.
Over the years, the Hillcrest Club became one of the area’s familiar gathering places. Its facilities included a 65-by-124-foot auditorium used for athletics, banquets, and meetings; six bowling alleys in a separate wing; a squash court; meeting rooms; locker rooms; a stage; and an outdoor tennis court. The club hosted employee organizations, union-management bargaining sessions, weddings, banquets, and community gatherings. Semi-professional basketball games were played there, and generations of children attended Ingersoll-Rand’s company Christmas parties at Hillcrest. On Wednesday morning, March 9, 1966, nearly 48 years of activity at the clubhouse came to an abrupt end.
Karl K. Mellert, Hillcrest’s resident manager for more than 37 years and then mayor of Lopatcong Township, was inside the building with his wife. Shortly before 10:30 a.m., Mellert was walking from the locker room toward the main banquet kitchen when he heard what he later described as a “puff.” Almost immediately, smoke began spreading through the building. Mellert attempted to telephone the fire department but found the line dead. He and his wife escaped as conditions rapidly deteriorated. Across the street, neighbor John Kutzler noticed smoke pouring from the clubhouse and ran over to assist Mellert while his wife contacted the Delaware Park Fire Company.
The first alarm was sounded at approximately 10:28 a.m. Jess Miers, president of the Delaware Park Fire Company, was among the first firemen to reach the scene. Arriving with the company’s tank truck, he found flames and heavy smoke enveloping the front of the building near the main entrance. The fire had already damaged electrical lines, cutting power to the immediate area and creating problems with the township’s alarm system. With the fire rapidly gaining ground, Miers called for additional assistance. A second alarm followed at approximately 10:35 a.m., bringing Phillipsburg’s fire companies to the hill. Firefighters from Harmony and Lopatcong Township also joined the operation.
By then, flames had broken through the roof. Heavy black smoke and sparks rose hundreds of feet above the hill and were visible for miles. The roof at the northern end eventually collapsed as fire swept through the north and west portions of the clubhouse. With homes standing nearby, the possibility of the fire extending beyond Hillcrest was a serious concern. Phillipsburg Mayor William Norton later explained that the town declared a general alarm largely because of the danger to the surrounding residences. The absence of a strong wind worked in the firefighters’ favor, and the blaze was confined to the clubhouse.
As hose streams were directed onto the building, efforts were also made to salvage what could still be reached. Mellert, Ingersoll-Rand employees, and others removed several pieces of furniture, including a piano and dishwasher. Mellert’s apartment at the southern end of the clubhouse was among the last areas reached by the flames, allowing additional belongings to be carried out and temporarily stored at the township garage. Most of Hillcrest’s contents could not be saved. The fire consumed the club’s athletic and meeting facilities along with approximately 500 folding chairs, numerous tables, sporting equipment, team uniforms, and other property accumulated through years of use. The fire also claimed property belonging to an organization that had been preparing for an event at Hillcrest. The Christian Service League of Harmony Presbyterian Church had stored between $4,000 and $5,000 worth of banquet equipment inside the building. It was to be used that Saturday for the Delaware Park Fire Company’s annual dinner. With the clubhouse destroyed and the equipment lost, the dinner was postponed.
One person, Richard Adams of Phillipsburg, was injured after falling from a ladder while assisting firefighters. He was transported by the Phillipsburg Emergency Squad to Warren Hospital for X-rays. By approximately 12:15 p.m., the main body of fire appeared to be under control. Some companies began leaving around 1 p.m., while others remained to wet down the ruins. Delaware Park firemen continued dealing with sporadic outbreaks throughout the night and into the following morning, and Ingersoll-Rand’s fire brigade remained to watch for additional flare-ups. The Phillipsburg Area Chapter of the American Red Cross and the Women’s Auxiliary of the Delaware Park Fire Company provided food and beverages for those working at the scene.
No immediate cause for the fire was determined. Ingersoll-Rand officials reported that the clubhouse carried a tax valuation of approximately $333,000, but in the immediate aftermath company representatives would not speculate on whether Hillcrest would be rebuilt. It would not be. The loss of the clubhouse brought an end to an institution that had been part of local life since the closing months of the First World War. Hillcrest had served several generations of Ingersoll-Rand employees and their families, while its athletic events, banquets, and other activities had made it familiar well beyond the company itself. The land, however, would not remain vacant for long.
The Hillcrest property occupied a scenic bluff behind Fairmount Cemetery in an area historically connected with the neighboring Ravenscroft estate. An old stone-lined roadway through the property once connected the clubhouse area with an industrial chimney and the adjoining Ravenscroft grounds. Following the fire, a variance allowed the former Hillcrest property to be redeveloped. By 1968, the Ravenscroft Apartments had been constructed on the former clubhouse site. In only two years, a property long associated with Ingersoll-Rand recreation and community gatherings had been transformed into a residential development. The surrounding landscape also changed with time. Portions of the wooded bluff eventually became state parkland associated with the Warren Highlands Trail system, preserving part of the landscape surrounding the former Hillcrest and Ravenscroft properties.
Today, the Ravenscroft Apartments occupy the site behind Fairmount Cemetery where the Hillcrest Clubhouse once stood. Little remains to tell a visitor that a large clubhouse once occupied the bluff or that, for nearly half a century, people climbed the hill to bowl, play basketball, attend meetings and banquets, celebrate weddings, or gather with fellow Ingersoll-Rand employees and their families. The fire of March 9, 1966, ended that chapter of the property’s history in a matter of hours. For Reliance Hose Company and the other Phillipsburg companies, it was also another major alarm outside their regular first-due districts. Alongside firefighters from Delaware Park, Harmony and Lopatcong, they worked that morning to contain the fire to the clubhouse and protect the homes surrounding one of the area’s best-known gathering places.
Sources: The Easton Express, March 9–10, 1966; additional historical research on the Hillcrest Club, Ravenscroft property and subsequent development of the site was found by Google Search.
***September 17, 1987 — Carl Joseph Co. Textile Mill Fire***
More than two decades after the Hillcrest Club fire brought Phillipsburg companies into the Delaware Park area, another major fire in Lopatcong Township called upon firefighters from throughout Warren County. This time, the destination was a textile mill at First Street and Park Avenue, where a morning fire would eventually bring ten fire companies to the scene. The alarm was received at approximately 7:58 a.m. on September 17, 1987, after one of three employees inside the Carl Joseph Co. textile mill discovered the fire.
According to Lopatcong Township Police Detective Sgt. Norman Viebrock, investigators believed the fire had already been burning for some time before employees realized what was happening. An attempt was made to control the flames with a fire extinguisher, but the fire had progressed beyond what could be handled inside the building. The first firefighters arrived within approximately five minutes of the alarm and were confronted with heavy fire already involving nearly the entire rear of the mill. From there, Viebrock recalled, the fire spread “real quickly.”
The Carl Joseph Co., owned by Carl Joseph of Lebanon, New Jersey, manufactured texturized yarn at the Delaware Park facility. Its location placed the mill immediately beside the Delaware Park Chemical Co. No. 1 firehouse, but the size and intensity of the fire quickly required resources well beyond the local companies. Delaware Park Chemical Co. and Lopatcong Fire Co. No. 2 were joined by mutual-aid companies from Phillipsburg, Huntington, Alpha, Harmony, Bloomsbury, Stewartsville, Asbury and Washington Borough. Both the Lopatcong and Phillipsburg emergency squads also responded. For Reliance Hose Company, the request for Phillipsburg assistance meant another mutual-aid run across the municipal line into neighboring Lopatcong Township.
Firefighters spent approximately four hours battling the blaze before bringing it under control. During the operation, William Kowalchuk of Delaware Park Chemical Co. suffered a burn to his leg. He was transported to Warren Hospital for treatment. After being treated, Kowalchuk returned to the fire scene and continued working with the crews battling the blaze. The fire also disrupted electrical service throughout the surrounding Delaware Park neighborhood. As a safety precaution, Jersey Central Power & Light temporarily shut off electricity to 109 customers for approximately half an hour. Another 85 customers in the immediate area remained without power from about 9 a.m. until 3 p.m.
Lopatcong Fire Chief Vincent Westcott, Assistant Chief James Marinelli and Police Chief Neil Corley remained at the scene for much of the day as firefighting and investigative operations continued. By the time the fire was brought under control, the Carl Joseph Co. textile mill had been destroyed. No immediate dollar figure was available, although investigators described the property loss as substantial. The preliminary investigation pointed toward a mechanical failure as the likely cause. Viebrock indicated that township investigators and representatives of the company’s insurance carrier would return to examine the ruins and determine more about how the fire began.
The destruction of the Carl Joseph mill was more than a Lopatcong Township alarm. With ten fire companies eventually committed, the incident became a regional operation drawing firefighters from communities across the surrounding area. For Reliance, on this September morning in 1987, that call once again led into Delaware Park, where Phillipsburg joined its neighboring departments in a four-hour fight to bring a major industrial fire under control.
Source: The Morning Call, Allentown, Pennsylvania, September 18, 1987.
***October 28, 1987 — Channel Home Center Fire at Hillcrest Mall***
For more than two decades, Hillcrest Mall had been a familiar landmark along Route 22 in Lopatcong Township. Opened in November 1963, the shopping center had experienced several fires over the years, including a serious blaze that destroyed the Plaza Restaurant in 1967. Twenty years later, Hillcrest would face a much larger fire.
Shortly before noon on October 28, 1987, employees of the Channel Home Center noticed smoke coming from a wall in the store’s electrical department. The fire was reported at approximately 11:45 a.m., and employees and customers began evacuating the building. Within minutes, flames were through the roof. Channel occupied approximately 25,700 square feet at the rear of the mall, near the athletic fields of Phillipsburg Catholic High School. The home-improvement store, comparable in purpose to the large home centers familiar today, had operated at Hillcrest Mall since October 1976, when it opened in the former W.T. Grant store.
What firefighters encountered that Wednesday morning was particularly difficult. Lumber, paint products, and other combustible materials inside Channel provided ample fuel, and the fire moved rapidly through the building. As conditions worsened, the evacuation expanded beyond Channel. Police and mall employees estimated that between 100 and 150 shoppers and employees were inside the shopping center at the time. Everyone was ordered from the complex, and employees were instructed to move their vehicles from the parking lot to make room for incoming fire apparatus.
The fire reached its height at approximately 12:30 p.m., about 45 minutes after it had been reported. Flames rose through the roof while a column of thick black smoke climbed above the mall and remained visible for nearly two hours. Contemporary newspaper accounts reported that the smoke could be seen from Easton and as far away as Hackettstown, more than 20 miles to the northeast. Firefighters from Lopatcong, Harmony and Phillipsburg initially worked to contain the blaze. Their concerns extended beyond the burning store itself. Adjoining businesses had to be protected, while underground natural-gas lines serving the shopping center raised fears of a possible explosion. Additional mutual aid continued arriving as the fire grew. Companies from Oxford, Belvidere and Glen Gardner were among those summoned, and the operation eventually involved 19 fire companies from Warren and Hunterdon counties.
The interior conditions eventually became too dangerous. After portions of the roof collapsed, firefighters withdrew and concentrated their efforts from outside the building, surrounding the fire with hose streams while working to keep it from extending through the remainder of Hillcrest Mall. Their efforts succeeded in confining the main fire to Channel at the eastern end of the shopping center. An adjoining vacant storefront, formerly occupied by a fabric store, suffered major smoke damage, while Orr’s Department Store sustained some exterior damage.
By approximately 1 p.m., flames were no longer visible above the building and the fire appeared to be under control. Considering the size of the response and the number of people who had been inside the shopping center, injuries were remarkably limited. The only injury reported in the newspaper accounts involved a firefighter who hurt a finger while laying water lines.
Lopatcong Township Detective Sgt. Norman Viebrock said the fire appeared to have originated along the western wall of Channel and was believed to be electrical in nature. Investigators returned the following day, joined by members of the New Jersey State Police Arson Unit. A cherry picker was used to clear a path through the collapsed roof, debris, and twisted steel so investigators could reach the area where the fire was believed to have started. No immediate damage figure was available, although early estimates placed the loss at more than $1 million.
The destruction came only a year after Hillcrest Realty Partners, an affiliate of the Kranzco Group, had reportedly invested more than $1 million renovating the shopping center. Channel employed 37 full- and part-time workers at Hillcrest, and following the fire the company began looking at temporarily transferring employees to its other stores in Bethlehem Township and Allentown. The October 1987 fire was not Hillcrest Mall’s first encounter with a major blaze.
During the early morning hours of April 12, 1967, fire had swept through the Plaza Restaurant at the shopping center. That alarm was received at approximately 3:35 a.m., and the restaurant was soon heavily involved. Most of its roof collapsed, its equipment was destroyed, and owner Charles Schaitman considered the business a total loss.Fire walls helped keep the flames from spreading directly into the adjoining Sherwin-Williams Paints and Western Auto stores, although both businesses suffered extensive smoke and water damage.
Delaware Park Fire Company responded with two trucks and was joined by Phillipsburg’s Lincoln Engine Company and Warren Chemical Engine Company. Contemporary reporting also noted that members from all Phillipsburg’s other fire companies assisted at the scene. The Plaza Restaurant fire was brought under control shortly before 5:30 a.m., although Delaware Park firefighters remained until around noon watching for flare-ups. For the next twenty years, it stood as the largest fire Hillcrest Mall had experienced… then came Channel.
The 1987 fire dwarfed the earlier incidents at the shopping center, drawing 19 companies and destroying one of Hillcrest’s major stores. Yet, despite the amount of combustible material inside Channel, the collapse of the roof and the tremendous column of smoke visible across the region, firefighters prevented the blaze from sweeping through the remainder of the mall. Separated by twenty years, the two fires became part of the history of both Hillcrest Mall and the generations of Phillipsburg firefighters who crossed the town line when their neighbor's needed assistance.
Sources: The Express, October 28–29, 1987; Easton Express, April 12, 1967.
***September 16, 2022 — Key City Diner Fire***
For generations of travelers along Route 22, the large glowing key outside the Key City Diner has been one of those familiar roadside landmarks that requires little introduction. Since opening in 1955, the diner at 985 Route 22 in Lopatcong Township had served local residents, travelers, and generations of regular customers. On the afternoon of September 16, 2022, a fire threatened to bring that long history to an end.
Shortly before 3 p.m., a female server reported smoke inside the building. Employees and the few customers who were in the diner at the time evacuated safely while the Lopatcong Township fire companies responded. What initially presented as smoke in the building proved more difficult to locate. Firefighters discovered an active fire concealed within a ceiling or wall, requiring crews to open portions of the building to reach the flames. As the incident developed, Lopatcong called for mutual aid from surrounding communities. Firefighters from Phillipsburg, Harmony, Pohatcong Township and Alpha responded to assist with the operation.
For Reliance Hose Company, the call represented another trip across the Phillipsburg town line into neighboring Lopatcong Township, continuing the mutual-aid relationship that had brought generations of Phillipsburg firefighters into the township for major fires and emergencies. Crews remained at Key City for several hours and did not clear the scene until approximately 5:30 p.m. No injuries were reported among the employees, customers, or emergency personnel.
The fire caused severe damage to both the interior and exterior of the diner. Lopatcong Township Police said the cause remained under investigation immediately afterward, although authorities did not consider the circumstances suspicious. Minor maintenance work had been taking place inside the building when the fire broke out. Although the building remained standing, the damage effectively brought an end to the Key City Diner that generations of customers had known. The original interior, with its familiar retro diner appearance, was destroyed.
The owners chose to rebuild. Rather than attempting to reproduce the old 1950s-style chrome and neon interior exactly as it had been, Key City was redesigned with a more modern appearance. The basic footprint remained largely familiar, retaining approximately 85 percent of the previous layout, including the counter and general flow remembered by longtime customers. After being closed for nearly two years, Key City Diner reopened on June 17, 2024.
The reopening marked another chapter for a Route 22 landmark approaching its seventh decade in business. The building looked different, and much of the interior that generations remembered was gone, but the diner remained at the same location, with its familiar key continuing to identify the property along the highway.
For Reliance, the September 2022 fire became a modern addition to a much older history of mutual aid into Lopatcong Township. The apparatus, equipment and methods had changed considerably from the calls answered by earlier generations of Reliance members, but the principle behind the response had not: when a neighboring community requested assistance, Phillipsburg answered. In this case, the fire became not the final chapter in Key City’s history, but the beginning of its rebuilding.
Source: lehighvalleylive.com, September 16, 2022; additional research on the history, reconstruction and reopening of Key City Diner.
***April 10, 2026 — Brakeley Gardens Apartment Fire***
Reliance Hose Company’s mutual-aid history into neighboring Lopatcong Township continued on the evening of April 10, 2026, when fire broke out inside an apartment at the Brakeley Gardens complex on Red School Lane. The alarm was reported at approximately 9 p.m. for a fire in the kitchen of Apartment H-3. Arriving Lopatcong Township police officers encountered heavy smoke and visible flames coming from the kitchen as residents began evacuating the building. Police officers immediately went to work with portable fire extinguishers, containing the flames until the Lopatcong Fire Department arrived and completed extinguishment.
The subsequent investigation determined that the fire had started accidentally when cooking oil in a pot on the stove ignited. Thanks to the early actions of police and the quick response of firefighters, the blaze was confined to the apartment where it originated and did not spread through the larger complex. With a working fire reported in a multi-family residential building, mutual aid was requested from neighboring departments. Companies from Phillipsburg, Alpha, Harmony, and Stewartsville responded to assist Lopatcong.
Reliance Hose Company responded from Phillipsburg as the Rapid Intervention Team (RIT), providing a dedicated crew at the scene in the event firefighters operating inside the building required emergency assistance. Reliance Assistant Chief Jim Oleniacz was serving as the Phillipsburg Fire Department’s officer in charge at the time of the alarm and met up with the Reliance crew at the scene. The Phillipsburg Emergency Squad also responded as part of the emergency operation.
Unlike many of the earlier mutual-aid fires preserved in Reliance’s history, the Brakeley Gardens alarm did not result in the loss of an entire building. The fire was stopped before it could extend beyond the apartment of origin, limiting the damage and preventing a kitchen fire from becoming a much larger incident in the occupied apartment complex.
For Reliance, the April 2026 response represents a modern example of the same mutual-aid system that has carried the company beyond Phillipsburg for generations. On this occasion, Reliance’s assignment was not to place a hose line into operation, but to stand ready as RIT for the firefighters working inside. It is a different role from many of the mutual-aid responses found in the old newspaper accounts, but an equally important part of the fireground operation.
Source: TAPinto Phillipsburg, April 13, 2026; Lopatcong Township Press Release information, April 11, 2026.
