Nude Man Fights Fire on Roof, 1932
One does not see many nude men on the road between Westerville and Galena. I drive that way often enough that I can assert that a nude man is a rare sight out that way. Especially on the roof of his house in broad daylight.
But never say never, because it did happen, once, in 1932.
On August 19, one Charles Henry Weber, Three C Highway, was taking a bath. Nothing unusual about that, but on this occasion an oil stove exploded.
Seeing the need for fast action, Weber jumped out of the bathtub, scrambled onto the roof, and beat out the flames using a handy garden hoe. The damage was limited to a few burnt shingles. Weber was unhurt, but in his haste he had forgotten to put on any pants. Or any other clothing. In fact, he dashed right from the bathtub to the burning roof without so much as a stitch of clothing.[1]
A crowd gathered, attracted by the noise of the explosion. The Columbus Dispatch reported that the crowd contained “both sexes” and that “faces of a number of women took on a crimson hue” at the sight of Weber’s “flesh attire.” Weber continued battling the blaze au natural until it was out.[2]
Do we know anything else about Charles Weber? Very little, I’m afraid. If we have the right man, he was born in Franklin County in 1869 and died in Galena in 1952. He was married, but had no children.[3] He farmed all his life. A faded picture is shown in Figure 1.
That Weber fought a dangerous house fire should not really surprise us. We don’t know if he had fire insurance, and while telephones were becoming common by the 1930s, they were not universal. Certainly, the emergency service of readily answered 911 calls was years in the future. If he had dawdled waiting for a volunteer fire company to respond, he could have lost everything. The deep Depression of 1932 did not help either.
Charles Weber putting out a fire in the buff was a comic character, but as with so much of history, when you examine it carefully, there is often a more serious reason. So I end by saying, bravo for Mr. Weber! He did the right thing, pants or not.
Charles Henry Weber
Portsmouth Times, August 20, 1932