Wood had never really talked about that night, Smith said.

Wood, who now lives in Florida, was house-sitting in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom in August, and the Smiths made a quick trip to tap his memory. The Smiths also were lucky to track down former Bellows Falls Village Fire Chief John Wood, who had been sworn in as chief only 14 days before the Star Hotel fire. Gallagher, who did the interviews, said the most moving part of the film in her mind came from a Springfield firefighter, Mark Morris, who told Gallagher and the Smiths that he had never talked about his traumatic experience that night. There were also photographs from a rooftop witness. The documentary features more than a dozen interviews, as well as never seen archival photos taken by reporters from the Brattleboro Reformer, which are now in the archives of the Brattleboro Historical Society. The men had grown up in Bellows Falls, and both had rushed to the downtown fire scene.įor Fuller, it was his “calling,” his brother, Stephen, told the filmmakers.įor Brown, on break from Castleton State College, it was his way of contributing to his community, his sister, Karen, said. “It was the perfect storm,” that created the tragedy.

“It’s their story to tell,” said Gallagher. The Smiths were behind the cameras, while Gallagher, off camera, conducted the interviews, starting in July. Mike and Sue Smith and Marty Gallagher interviewed 17 people - the vast majority of them area firefighters - who were at the fire, as well as Brown and Fuller family members who remembered their loved ones and the aftermath of the fire. 29, 1981, “Called to Duty,” has been created by the staff and volunteers of Falls Area Community Television, and the 90-minute film will debut next Thursday at the Bellows Falls Opera House, as part of an event to raise funds for the Brown-Fuller Memorial Park that is currently under construction on the site of the old hotel on The Square. The Star Hotel became synonymous as a local nightmare.īrown and Fuller died at opposite sides of the hotel, and their deaths - like the later tragedy of 9/11 that took the lives of hundreds of New York City firefighters - had a lasting effect on the local community and its fire department.Ī documentary about the night of Dec. Seven other firefighters were injured that night - either from frostbite or smoke inhalation - at the fire.

The two firefighters, graduates of Bellows Falls Union High School, died of smoke inhalation, despite being rescued by their fellow firefighters.

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