Fire storm

For one brief, precarious moment, you could see the clench in Jeanne Leonard's throat as she tried to speak. 

Her eyes moistened.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I get this way sometimes when I think about it."

Leonard, like the rest of us, was already deep into the Tuesday twilight. But she couldn't even get a block away from her house as she walked her dog when consoling friends collected around her in ones and twos to offer comfort or to lend an ear.

Less than 18 hours earlier, around 1 a.m. Tuesday morning, a large part of her life – and the Ebelein family legacy – vanished in a devastating fire that destroyed the iconic Candy Factory and next-door neighbor Shoto Japanese Steakhouse & Seafood. Also affected by the blaze were Bagels and More on Main as well as Main Street Pizza and Deli as both of those flanking businesses suffered substantial water and smoke damage.

The second floor of Shoto's and The Candy Factory.

 All four businesses were located on the same block of North Main Street, side by side by side by side. 

Most of us probably walked past them a 1,000 times in happier days without a second glance, never once thinking they were the beating heart of Lexington's Uptown economy. 

"I was always afraid of a fire," said Leonard. "We had restaurants on either side of us. I always made sure we were heavily insured.

"And the buildings were very old, dating back to the 1890s," said Leonard. "(The threat of fire) was always there."

These days, Leonard no longer has a physical connection with The Candy Factory. She and her sisters, Leigh Foster and Beth Dean, sold the business to Wynn and Annette Conrad in 2018, and the Conrads faithfully kept the character and nature of the place intact throughout their ownership.

Ahh. But there's still the emotional connection. And all that history...

Did Robert Ebelein know he was creating something special when he bought the old Lexington Hardware store in 1979 so he could move his Candy Factory storefront from Talbert Boulevard to Main Street? His wife, Frances, decorated the place with antiques and loaded the display cases with chocolates and gum drops and nostalgic candies from everybody's childhood. Mary Janes. Mallow Cups. Clark Bars. Chuckles. Chunkys. Jelly beans. The front door of the place became a portal for time travel to our youth. It was irresistible.

When Frances died in 2002, her daughters took over. The place was already a destination point that was known across the state. No, make that across the southeast. There were newspaper articles, television interviews, even a story or two in Our State Magazine. Iconic doesn't even begin to describe the place, or what it means to Lexington. Even though the business is less than 50 years old, it feels like its been here since 1890. And that's intentional. That's the point.

The whole block is essentially an anchor for Uptown Lexington. Shoto's, operated by the Huynh family, has been in business since 2001, and Main Street Deli has been going continuously by the Hearn family since 1978. Bagels and More is the youngest kid on the block, less than 10 years old and is the only bagel shop in town.

•  •  •

The fire could have been worse, although I suspect the Conrads and the Huynhs might feel differently. The roof collapsed on both places, insuring total destruction. And probably lengthy recovery.

Frankie Nance was standing outside the Army-Navy Store Tuesday morning, directly across the street from The Candy Factory, watching firefighters put out stubborn flames that somehow kept resurrecting themselves.

"This is awful," said Nance, who owns the Army-Navy Store. 

Was he concerned that embers could fly across Main Street and endanger his place?

"You bet I was," said Nance. Full disclosure: he was much more colorful in his answer than I just gave him credit for. 

"I was here this morning when the firefighters opened the door to the Deli," said Nance. "The water came out in a torrent. It was like watching the Mississippi River come through."

Mayor Jason Hayes was also on hand Tuesday morning, taking stock of the disaster to his city.

Will the city help with the recovery of the businesses?

"We're already looking into possible grants," said Hayes. "There are Main Street programs that might offer grants, as well as state-funded fire recovery grants for businesses."

No matter what happens, Lexington's Uptown history took an unexpected turn Tuesday morning. Rebuilding might be problematic for some of these places. How do you bring back creaky wooden floors and brick-and-mortar walls that gave texture to the history of the town? How do you replace one-of-a-kind antiques that silently told us stories about our past?

How does your throat not clench? How do your eyes not water?