It was a family-owned business steeped in family memories, some but not all now up in smoke. As the manager of Coleman’s sifted through the charred remains of Coleman’s Original Calabash Seafood Restaurant, she managed a smile and even gratitude following an Aug. 16 blaze that burned the riverfront building and temporarily put Coleman’s out of business.
The Calabash Volunteer Fire Department had done a phenomenal job saving irreplaceable articles about her family and business displayed on the restaurant’s pale blue walls, Coleman said as she stood in the burned entry of the eatery nearly a month after the fire.
“We did get a lot of things saved,” Nixon said. “At first (the fire) was hard for me to accept. My husband said the memories are in my heart, and I’ve come to accept that. And we are going to rebuild and we’ll have new memories.” For now, they’ve been combing through the debris and getting focused on rebuilding.
Nixon said the source of the late-night fire, reported at 11:36 on a Saturday, was electrical and apparently had broken out over the kitchen broiler area. She said that was the preliminary determination through insurance and investigation honing in on the restaurant’s electrical wiring. She’s also hoping they’ll be rebuilding soon and ready for a re-opening “at least by Easter.”
The fire at Coleman’s has been one of nearly a half-dozen restaurant fires and incidents in nearly as many years in Calabash, begging the question: Does the Seafood Capital get an inordinate number of restaurant fires? Maybe — considering the number of restaurants that are there. “Some of these buildings are old,” said Calabash building inspector/code enforcement officer Stanley Dills, adding that “does not mean they are not still in good condition”. “We do periodic fire inspections on these buildings as part of state requirements,” he said, adding the inspections include safety issues.
Depending on when they were built, as many as 50 years ago, the buildings might have been grandfathered and may not be required to come up to code, Dills said. Talk to restaurant owners who have been through a fire, and they wouldn’t wish it on their worst enemy.
Beck’s fire
Two years ago, about an hour after closing time Oct. 22, 2012, fire broke out at Beck’s Original Calabash Restaurant, gutting the interior of the historic 72-year-old River Road restaurant. Two years later after rebuilding, restaurant owner Shawn Bellamy, who is also Coleman’s cousin, said she is still dealing with the repercussions.
“We were way underinsured,” she said. Just this past July, results of an investigation in the blaze had finally determined the “exact wire” in the attic that led to the fire, she said. The building had received several additions over the years, leading to three different rooflines. “It was a nightmare getting up there,” Bellamy said, adding the faulty wiring was between the “second and third roofline” and had probably been smoldering all day before the fire, reported at 10:10 p.m., broke out.
“One of the cooks smelled something behind the building,” Bellamy said. “Inside, you couldn’t smell a thing.” Losing a restaurant like that is “like a death in the family,” Bellamy said. “It’s the most helpless I ever felt standing out there watching it burn down.”
The loss included mementos of her mom, longtime Calabash restaurateur Sheryl Hardee, who died in 2007, that couldn’t be replaced. Beck’s was rebuilt and reopened in April 2013. Since the fire, Bellamy said she keeps after her brother and business partner, Kurt Hardee, to make sure Ella’s, their other popular family seafood restaurant just down the road, is thoroughly checked out and safe from any electrical problems.
While Ella’s has undergone renovations and redecorating over the years, it still has its same “old bones and same frame wiring,” dating back to the 1950s, Bellamy said. “We had an inspection done right after Beck’s burned down.”
Nowadays, “we have people coming in inspecting our hood systems quarterly,” Bellamy said. “They update fire extinguishers and sprinklers in the kitchen. They’ll cancel (coverage) if you don’t pass.”
Capt. Nance’s Fire
As to why there seem to have been so many restaurant fires in Calabash over the years, “I wish I knew, because I had one myself,” said Doris Nance, standing recently in the kitchen of her own rebuilt riverfront restaurant, Captain Nance’s, which caught fire and burned shortly after closing time July 21, 1999. “Mine started up in the attic,” Nance said. “It was electrical.”
That’s what fire investigators determined, the source of the blaze narrowed down to an electrical problem in the ceiling between the waitress station and kitchen. According to a news report, waitresses that evening had also complained about how hot it was, one of the hottest nights they’d known. “It was just having an old building; it was just the wiring,” said Nance of the original Calabash eatery built by her late husband, Lennon, decades ago for $17,000.“I think everybody here was crying; they were out of jobs,” Nance said. “I had to build back for the young’uns so they’d have something to do.”
Capt. John’s Seafood House
Michael Frink also blames an electrical problem for the Nov. 30, 2010, fire of his own family restaurant, Capt. John’s Seafood House, two doors down from Captain Nance’s and next door to Coleman’s on the Calabash Riverfront.
Brunswick County Fire Marshal Scott Garner attributed the cause of the blaze to an electrical short in wires near two 50-gallon aquariums at the restaurant entrance. Frink said the problem related to the aquariums’ circulation pumps or the ballast in their fluorescent lighting, which typically aren’t strong enough to kick the breaker.
The fire gutted the restaurant, putting it out of commission for months. “It was a nightmare getting the permit to rebuild,” Frink said. “We rebuilt in two months once we got the permit.” Calabash traditionally has consisted of a network of family-owned seafood restaurants. Two of its oldest, Beck’s and Coleman’s, were launched by sisters. Frink said his parents and uncle built the Dockside Seafood House, which also burned in November 1986, at the opposite end of the riverfront.
“It’s kind of like Calabash is a big family,” Frink said, adding an adjacent restaurant might be run by an operator’s “sister, brother or cousin. “Everybody kind of pulls together and tries to help each other out,” he said. “It’s just always been that way.” The buildings where these families have earned their living through the years are old, and standards have changed, Frink said. “I would just think a lot of (the fires) are a result of that,” he said. There are also any number of things to monitor and that can go wrong in this business, such as a box pushed up too close to an outlet, he said. Now when he hears a fire siren, Frink shudders.
“I know what a terrible thing somebody might be getting ready to go through,” he said. “Once you’ve been through a fire you’re never the same.” They were able to salvage kitchen equipment and have tables and chairs professionally cleaned and reupholstered. Frink said they were fortunate to re-open the following June. But to have to go through something like that is “something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy,” he said. “It still left an indelible impression in my memory.”
This article first appeared in the Brunswick Beacon.
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