Blaze at Historic Hotel in Glendale Injures 1 and Leaves $20,000 Damage

A fire broke out early Friday in a historic Glendale residential hotel, injuring one tenant, forcing the evacuation of nearly 100 others and causing $20,000 damage to the 65-year-old building, fire officials said.

The blaze began shortly before 1 a.m. in a second-story room in the six-story Glendale Hotel, on Glendale Avenue across the street from City Hall, said Battalion Chief Chris Gray of the Glendale Fire Department.

About 40 firefighters took about 10 minutes to contain the fire, which was ignited when a lamp with a bare light bulb fell onto a bed and caused the sheets to heat up and smolder, Gray said.

The tenant of the room, James Thompson, 26, lost most of his belongings in the fire. Smoke damaged parts of the building and water damage was reported at Flamingo Tours and Travels, a store located beneath Thompson’s room at the lobby level, said Joseph Veloz, the hotel’s manager.

Thompson was not in his room when the fire started. He said later that he had left about midnight to play pool at a nearby bar.

But smoke that poured throughout the building forced firefighters to evacuate the hotel’s residents, many of whom are elderly or disabled. It also sent Arthur Bransky, a 71-year-old tenant with severe emphysema, to Glendale Adventist Medical Center for treatment of smoke inhalation.

Bransky was treated and released, a hospital spokeswoman said.

The Glendale Hotel, built in 1925 at a cost of $640,000, was hailed at the time as a stylish apartment and dining establishment that would provide lodging and lobby-level stores, Glendale planning documents show.

In the late 1920s, its developers and a local entrepreneur named Thomas Slate intended to make its rooftop a landing area for a rigid dirigible that Slate was building. The plan, according to Barbara Boyd, a special collections librarian at Glendale Central Library, was to fly the dirigible to New York and back, with passengers unloading by cable elevator on the rooftop and staying at the hotel.

The idea was scrapped, however, when the flying machine broke down during its launch, Boyd said.

The hotel was named a city historical landmark in 1977. A wine cellar known as “The Cave” is open in the basement. Eight shops, including a watchmaker, tailor, barbershop and old-time cafe, line the lobby level, with doors opening to the sidewalks. Green awnings complement the hotel’s red and tan brick exterior.

The building has smoke alarms in each of its estimated 91 rooms and has fire hoses in the hallways, but it did not have an automatic sprinkler system, which probably could have prevented the spread of smoke, Gray said. Under a recently passed city ordinance, it will be required to have such a system within three years, he said.