A fire that swept through downtown Victor in April 1981 damaged four buildings, displaced four residents and disrupted roughly one-third of the village’s retail trade, according to a historical account shared by the Victor Fire Department.
The department revisited the April 29, 1981, blaze in a “Throwback Thursday” Facebook post, describing a disaster that prompted a regional firefighting response and helped shape the village’s subsequent rebuilding efforts.
Flames tore through buildings along East Main Street that night in what officials described at the time as Victor’s worst fire since the 1930s.
The fire gutted the entire second floor of one building. Its brick facade was left so unstable that crews brought in a crane the following morning to demolish it.
Approximately 100 firefighters responded from Victor, Fishers, Farmington, East Bloomfield, Manchester, Canandaigua, Egypt and Mendon. Victor Fire Chief Glenn Lockwood directed the response.
The department’s account puts the damage at an estimated $250,000 at the time.
Affected businesses included Roger Gear and Sons Plumbing and Heating, Avalon’s Hair Fashions, the Valerie Leopold Dance Workshop, the Victor Apothecary and General Store, and Lolis Restaurant. The Cobblestone Building, which housed R.L. Anderson Insurance and Morris & Moshenberg Attorneys, also was affected.
Four people living in upstairs apartments were left homeless.
Among them were a local mother and her high school senior son, who lost virtually everything. The department said the teenager’s comic book collection, valued at $3,000 and intended to help fund his college education, was among the losses.
The effects extended beyond the immediate destruction. According to the department, efforts to rebuild and revitalize the damaged business district ultimately led the Village Board to establish Victor’s Urban Renewal Agency in 1982.
Fire has shaped downtown Victor at other points in its history. The department’s historical account traces its founding in 1904 to a series of nine fires in 1898 and 1899 that destroyed nearly two-thirds of the business district.
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