Fiery sermon not the cause of the blaze!
One winter evening, on Monday Feb. 19, 1924, Reverend David A. Gregg, pastor, of the Meeker Methodist Episcopal Church began ringing the church bell to sound an alarm that a fire was blazing in the church. Several neighbors and townspeople came hurriedly to the scene.
Someone telephoned Undersheriff Nichols to report a riot at the Methodist Church. Nichols arrived at the church and found Rev. Gregg and a number of men, all heavily armed. The pastor claimed that an attempt had been made to fire the church: that he had seen three or four men making their escape; that he had fired several shots at the alleged escaping fire-bugs; … a rock or brick-bat being thrown through the glass of his front door.
Ben Nichols pushed the church doors open and found a blaze getting well underway. He kicked the “smudge” out into the street and extinguished the fire. The Rocky Mountain News picked up the story and a few details altered a bit. The Denver Post jumped on the story with some very creative exaggerations. According to the Post a “huge boulder was rolled thru the front door. Bricks, stones, clubs, and missiles of every description rained upon the house.”
The Methodist minister, clad only in his pajamas, stood in the snow blazing away at the lawless mob with a revolver. “As hot lead whizzed thru the ranks of the mob,” the attackers broke and formed again out of range and then proceeded to set fire to his church. Flames were shooting from windows of the structure by the time help arrived.
Rev. Gregg told everyone that the mob was taking revenge for the raids staged there Monday by state prohibition officers who arrested a score of persons. The Post went on to explain that Gregg had been leading a campaign to clean up Meeker and it was he who supplied tips that led to the raids on the local pool halls. Gregg reported threats to himself and had been sleeping with a revolver under his pillow. The Denver Post had inflated a smoldering pile of hymnals in the church entryway into an engulfing blaze. The “huge boulder” at the parsonage was a half brick from the street thrown through a window.
The Meeker Herald took a much more professional view of events in its February 23, 1924, issue with the headline “ARSON ATTEMPT Trying to Burn Down the Methodist Church—Was it a Frame up?” District Attorney Frank Delaney took over the investigation personally. Things did not add up and not everyone in town was convinced of Gregg’s account or accusations against lawless bootleggers getting revenge. Delaney wasted no time in telegraphing O.T. Quillen in Colorado Springs requesting the assistance of two of Colorado’s best tracking dogs.
Our “tail” continues next week.
By ED PECK
Sources: Meeker Herald 1924, The Denver Post, Rocky Mountain News. Coloradohistoricnewspapers.org