Battlefield Station owners hope to reopen

The owners of Battlefield Station, an East Battlefield hobby and train shop that was destroyed in a Nov. 4 fire, have tentative plans to reopen the shop in four to six months.

"Our desire is to reopen, but there are a lot of things still up in the air, a lot of unanswered questions," owner Craig King said. "If we did reopen, it would be anywhere from March to May."

King and Larry Levine last summer remodeled the former nightclub at 1249 E. Battlefield to resemble a turn-of-the-century train depot and opened Battlefield Station in the space in August. The store, located next door to Ozark Fitness Center, was a purveyor of railroad memorabilia, train and hobby products. It also held King's and Levine's private train and railroad artifact collections, as well as other collections that were on loan to the store for display.

The fire, which started a few minutes before 5 a.m. Nov. 4, is being investigated as arson, according to Fire Investigator David Cantrell, of the Springfield Fire Department. He said the Fire Department is waiting on the lab results of evidence sent to the Missouri Highway Patrol crime lab in Jefferson City.

"The fire itself has been ruled as incendiary, and we are investigating it as an arson offense; but we're waiting for confirmation from the crime lab on that," Cantrell said. "We're hopeful that we can find who did it, but leads are scarce in this case, to be honest."

He said it usually takes about 30 days for the Fire Department to get results from the crime lab. Cantrell said anyone who has any information about the fire should contact the fire department.

He said that judging from the amount of damage to the northeast side of the building included the roof collapsing the fire started there and moved inward.

The building, leased from Cartoons owner Gary Summers, sustained some outer damage to its northeast side. The majority of the damage is to the inside of the building. Summers said the building will need a new roof and that he is working with engineers to determine if the building is structurally sound.

"They're making the determinations about how much of the steel is actually damaged. We'll have to reroof it, and of course gut it to get rid of the smoke damage to the inside," Summers said.

Levine said a buyer for a salvage company came to the store Nov. 21 and hauled away a few boxes of the store's items that were not destroyed. He said the building's insurance company ruled the inside of the building a total loss, but that they did not have an estimate on the dollar amount of lost inventory.

"There was inventory, fixtures and equipment it'll be a considerable amount," King said.

King said those involved with the investigation speculated that the fire was set by kids or cruisers on Battlefield, and that investigators found evidence of accelerants at the scene.

"It's sad to say, but there are sick people out there who do stuff like that with no rhyme or reason ... Even the fact that we took over the parking lot (which had been empty for a year), could have been a reason. That was the main hangout for a lot of the cruisers," King said.

He said the only upside to the cause of the fire being arson is that both he and Levine know that they didn't accidentally destroy their store. Levine's collection of model trains and King's sizable collection of Missouri Pacific artifacts and pictures were among the losses.

"Some of it we were able to salvage, but most of it we weren't. Pictures don't do well in fires," King said. "I'd been collecting for about 10 years."

King said they were happy with the store's performance before the fire, despite it having been open for three months.

"The number of people coming through the door was more important than sales. It was a family place we've had a lot of people come by with their kids to say how sorry they are about what happened," King said. "The whole reason we opened in August was to get things set up for Christmas."

Before opening Battlefield Station, King and Levine owned Mainline Model Supply in Chesterfield Village for six years. When Battlefield Station opened, they closed Mainline and moved its inventory to the new store. Battlefield Station was much more than a business to them, they said.

"We hoped to make money on the store, obviously, but that's not why we opened it. The most fun thing about it was seeing the little boys and girls who would come in and want to run the trains and blow the whistles," King said. "The fire will of course be a financial trial to endure for us, but that's not the hardest part of it."