Leaving the clothes on his back, 86-year-old Navy veteran Roosevelt Pullem said Eaton Fire It tore down their Los Angeles County home, but it couldn’t destroy the memories he and his late wife shared over the decades.
“I cried. I kind of couldn’t hold it in,” Pullem told ABC Los Angeles station. KABC On Tuesday night, his initial reaction to seeing the house in Altadena reduced to coal ruins. “I kept thinking to myself, ‘You have memories, you have memories.'”
Pullem, a retired nurse who served in the Korean War, said she was inside her home on Jan. 7 when the Eaton Fire swept through her neighborhood, leveling house after house. When he opened his front door to check how close the fast-spreading fire had gotten to his property, he said he saw the flames “swirling towards me”.
Roosevelt Pullem, 86, said he lost his Altadena home in the Eaton Fire.
KABC
Pullem said he took the car keys and fled. As he drove away, he said the last thing he saw was flames in the back of the house.
When he finally returned to his home, Pullem said, there was nothing left of the wreckage. His only intact possession was his vintage 1963 Volkswagen Beetle sitting in his driveway.
“There were only tears in my eyes. I’ve been there so long and I have wonderful thoughts about my wife and myself,” Pullem said of his wife of 29 years, Melwetha Pullem, who died in February 2013 after a long illness.
Altadena resident Roosevelt Pullem, an 86-year-old Army veteran, said all he could do was cry when he returned home to find the group burned in the Eaton Fire.
KABC
An obituary A press release from Woods-Valentine Mortuary in Pasadena described Pullem’s wife, who was also a registered nurse, as a “fervent Christian” who “cared for those in need. Most important was the love and joy she shared with her beloved Roosevelt.” and inseparable.”
Pullem, who turns 87 next month, said he is too old to start over. However, relatives have set up a GoFundMe campaign to help recover from the disaster, writing: “His home was not just a shelter, but a storehouse of memories, keepsakes and the life he built with his wife over decades.”
In the meantime, it lives in the Pasadena Convention Center, which has become an emergency shelter for fire victims.
“I’ve been through the good, the bad and the ugly,” Pullem said. “But in my life, the good outweighs the ugly way more than I could have dreamed.”
The Eaton Fire broke out just before 6:00 p.m. Pacific Time on January 7, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire).
Fueled by winds from Hurricane Santa Ana, the fire – which broke out during what the National Weather Service declared an “extremely hazardous situation” – ravaged many neighborhoods in the communities of Altadena and Pasadena, destroying about 7,000 structures, among others. homes and businesses, and burning 14,000 acres.
Roosevelt Pullem, an 86-year-old Army veteran, said all that remained intact was his 1963 Volkswagen Beetle, pictured here on Jan. 13, 2025, in the driveway of his Altadena home that was destroyed in the Eaton fire.
KABC
The Eaton Fire, which was 35 percent contained as of Tuesday morning, is the second largest of the infernos burning within 45 square miles of Los Angeles County. The Palisades Fire in the oceanfront community of Pacific Palisades also started on the morning of Jan. 7 and has grown to nearly 24,000 acres, making it the largest of the wildfires.
The Palisades Fire has destroyed about 5,000 structures, including homes and businesses. The fire was 17 percent contained on Tuesday as firefighters anticipated the reappearance of strong Santa Ana winds, which are expected to sweep through the drought-stricken region through Wednesday, fueling the flames even more.
At least 24 fire-related deaths have been attributed to the Eaton and Palisades fires, according to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner’s Office.
