@JLeslie My mom and my grandmother always taught me not to play with fire, and that taught me a respect for it, bordering on paranoid, and then when I lived in the building that burned, that did it.
Mohonk Mountain House would go up like a tinder box if there were ever a fire there, since it was built in the late 1800s, and is all wood. I wonder if they have a fireplace policy for guests, like the staff will assist you in making a fire in the fireplace, and the staff has to put it out or something similar.
There was a story in the news here, around 12 years ago, about a woman in Stamford CT who had 3 little girls. I believe it was Christmas eve, and the woman’s father was staying over, and her boyfriend lived there, I think if I remember correctly. The boyfriend was a contractor and the house was very large, maybe the boyfriend was doing construction on it. Anyway, they had a fire in the fireplace, and then when they went to bed, the boyfriend put the bucket of ashes out, outside the front door. The fire was apparently not out and the whole house burned down. The woman and the boyfriend survived, the 3 little girls and the father of the woman did not survive. Imagine the anguish the woman has to live with for the rest of her life? Unimaginable pain. I’m going to try to find a link for it. The conclusion was that the bucket of ashes should have been doused with water, not just left smoldering outside the front door.