With RV company closings and job layoffs, the small community of Wakarusa has seen its fair share of challenges. And Wednesday night, Wakarusa is dealt another blow.

A large fire broke out at a building that's home to two local businesses. The building is the old farmer's market in town, on County Road 40, just east of County Road 19. One business is destroyed and another has some major damage.

What's really unfortunate is the owner of the destroyed business just moved in Wednesday.
Scott Tuttle, the owner of Livin’ Lite RVs, told Newscenter 16 that he just completed a lot of work on the interior of the building before moving his materials inside. His company makes small, pop-up RV campers.

Just as many folks’ work days were wrapping up, this fire broke out in Wakarusa's old farmer's market, home to Livin’ Lite RVs and Hart Housing.

“I was getting ready to leave work and the owner of the building over here next to us on the other side, he came over pointing up at that building,” says Michelle Marks. Marks works at a body shop next door. After taking a look at the flames, he ran to make sure everyone was out of the building. Minutes later, the fire engulfed the roof.

“It was just coming up through the roof and in a matter of five minutes or less it was shooting out through the roof,” says Brent Wiseman, who works next store.

At one point, nearly 50 volunteer firefighters, from five departments were on the scene. “It took us longer cause it got up in the attic and worked towards the north, had a little extra problems,” says Wakarusa Fire Chief Brian Maurer. Maurer says it took about an hour and fifteen minutes to put out the fire.

Tuttle says he's devastated by his loss, but glad everyone's OK. Right now, he's grateful he has insurance.

And like any challenges the people of Wakarusa have faced in the past, they say they have nowhere to go but up. “It's going to hurt the town a little bit, but we're a strong community around here, we're going to build as fast as we can and go from there,” says Gabe Sterling. Sterling works at hart Housing, a business damaged by the fire.

“It's time for 'Wakie' [Wakarusa] to get a little bit of a break, maybe if we could have something good happen around here,” says Marks.

Fortunately, firefighters say no one was injured Wednesday night. The exact cause of the fire is still under investigation.

Officials with Hart Housing say they have offices down the road they can use. They also managed to salvage a number of their computers, before the fire spread.

As for Tuttle's Livin' Lite RVs, he says he will have to move his operation to another place, at least temporarily because he has orders to fill.