Cheryl Spector: Gay History Destroyed In Arlington Apartment Fire
A historian lost much of her collection of gay history photos and artifacts in an apartment fire Wednesday. Fire officials said that how that collection was being stored could have hampered their firefighting efforts.
"This is the nightmare of nightmares that there's a fire," said historian Cheryl Spector.
Spector said that while she was at work Wednesday, her life's passion was going up in smoke.
"I'm a historian and archivist and there was archival material that will never be able to be replaced and it's very sad," she said.
Spector said that after coming out as a lesbian in 1983, she has been using still cameras and video equipment to document the local history of the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community in the D.C. region.
"The gay prides, victories, Supreme Court rulings and protests and marches, funerals, a lot of funerals of people who are prominent who died of HIV and AIDS over the years," said Spector.
However, fire officials said the four-foot high stacks of materials she had organized all throughout her apartment made it difficult to fight smoke and flames that alert neighbors spotted.
"Obviously it's a fire hazard. It prevents you from aggressively attacking the fire. As well, it poses a threat to tenants, especially in a multi-family dwelling like an apartment building. With the fire load it has, this could have been much worse," said Deputy Fire Chief Dan Barksdale of the Arlington County Fire Department.
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"This is the nightmare of nightmares that there's a fire," said historian Cheryl Spector.
Spector said that while she was at work Wednesday, her life's passion was going up in smoke.
"I'm a historian and archivist and there was archival material that will never be able to be replaced and it's very sad," she said.
Spector said that after coming out as a lesbian in 1983, she has been using still cameras and video equipment to document the local history of the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community in the D.C. region.
"The gay prides, victories, Supreme Court rulings and protests and marches, funerals, a lot of funerals of people who are prominent who died of HIV and AIDS over the years," said Spector.
However, fire officials said the four-foot high stacks of materials she had organized all throughout her apartment made it difficult to fight smoke and flames that alert neighbors spotted.
"Obviously it's a fire hazard. It prevents you from aggressively attacking the fire. As well, it poses a threat to tenants, especially in a multi-family dwelling like an apartment building. With the fire load it has, this could have been much worse," said Deputy Fire Chief Dan Barksdale of the Arlington County Fire Department.