Fire damages remodeled Hammond bar before it could reopen
By Michelle L. Quinn Post-Tribune correspondent September 4, 2012 2:38PM
The Yellowstone Bar and Grill, formerly known as the Copper Penny, is boarded up after a fire around 5PM on Monday September 4, 2012. Hammond fire responded to the fire and quickly put out the blaze. | Jim Karczewski~for Sun-Times Media
Maps
Updated: September 4, 2012 11:28PM
HAMMOND — The cause and extent of damages to a bar that caught fire the day it was to reopen remain undetermined, but the owner appears to have been lucky they weren’t worse.
Deputy Fire Chief Kevin Margraf said Tuesday firefighters collected more information from the the wreckage at Yellowstone Bar and Grill, 7015 Kennedy Ave., and said based on pictures taken, the damage should be repairable. Owner Steve Hekkel had remodeled the former Copper Penny Sports Bar & Grill and it was supposed to open at 6 p.m. Monday when the fire broke out.
Margraf said there’s uncertainty as to whether Hekkel has insurance on the building.. He said an independent agency will be called in to help with the investigation.
Firefighters were called to the building about 5 p.m. Monday, Margraf said. There were no injuries.
The Copper Penny was the scene of a fatal stabbing in January 2011. Victor Adams, 34, of West Lafayette, suffered stab wounds in the neck with a knife after a fight broke out at the bar.
