POWNAL — As a farmer, Keith Armstrong has experience with nature’s unpredictable forces, but the early morning fire that leveled his maple sap house and destroyed the equipment and hundreds of gallons of syrup had to rank among the farm’s most devastating setbacks.
He said it was difficult for him to survey the blackened remains of the structure, but he knew no one had been hurt and it could be replaced in time.
“We are going to rebuild,” Armstrong said of the sugar shack he began erecting in 1976 on a hillside near his farm stand on Route 7 just south of the Bennington line.
But the apparent loss of personal items belonging to his longtime friend, the late Walt Babcock, was harder to take.
“That did get to me,” he said. “That can’t be replaced.”
The items included a pair of gloves with Babcock’s name on them and a pair of tall boots used around the shack when the maple sap was being boiled down into maple syrup.
Armstrong said the two grew up in Pownal, served in the military together and were longtime hunting and fishing buddies before Babcock’s death in 2009.
LIGHTNING SUSPECTED
Armstrong said Pownal firefighters were on the scene before he was aware of the fire, at first responding to a report of a possible brush fire in the wooded area around the sap house. He got a phone call at 2:47 a.m.
The probable cause of blaze, Armstrong said he was told by fire investigators, was lightning.
He said it appeared to him that a propane line from a tank outside also might have been broken by something falling on it, resulting in a more intense blaze.
“I don’t think wood would burn that hot,” he said.
SYRUP LOST
While about 500 gallons of maple syrup from the recent season was lost, Armstrong said the farm produced about twice that amount and some of it was stored elsewhere.
“On the other hand,” he said with a farmer’s optimism, “the pumpkin crop looks like the best ever, and the corn looks good.”
The farm stand is possibly best known for elaborate, traffic-slowing pumpkin displays on the nearby farmhouse lawn every autumn.
Armstrong said Thursday that he believed property insurance will help him cover the farm’s losses. Community members also are stepping up to aid Armstrong and his family.
Ryan and Heather Hassett, owners of the Bennington Pizza House and other local businesses, said they will donate a percentage of the restaurant’s proceeds from Thursday through Saturday to the Armstrongs.
Heather Hassett said Friday that patrons also have been offering further donations to the farm.
“Being in business is hard enough,” she said. “And being a farmer is harder than ever. We want to do anything we can to ease that burden.”
Other fund-raising efforts also have been posted on Facebook since the fire.
WILL BE BACK
Armstrong said his focus remains on rebuilding the sugaring building and continuing that business as a key product of his farm.
“As I told the boys,” he said, referring to grandsons Conner and Evan, “I’ve been knocked down before in my life. But when you get back up it’s a plus.”
Armstrong said in a prior Banner interview that he took over the farm operations in 1987. The farm has been in his family since 1868.
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Armstrong plans to rebuild after sugar house fire - Bennington Banner
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