SUMMIT TWP — James Ward had remodeled 90% of the family home he bought from his great aunt in 2010, but all those improvements plus any hope of additional happy memories in the house went up in smoke Tuesday, April 11.

A two-alarm fire at the Ward family’s home on Vogleyville Road off Herman Road rendered the house a total loss.

An exhausted Ward said Wednesday, April 12, that his 22-year-old daughter, who is autistic, noticed something was amiss late Tuesday morning when she came down the stairs and looked in the sunroom on the back of the house.

“She told her mom something was wrong,” Ward said. “She was calm as heck about it.”

When his wife, Melissa, saw flames on the back porch, she got their daughter, four dogs and three of four cats out of the house.

“Everything but our cellphones and what we had on our backs was lost,” Ward said. “You hear about fires or see videos, or maybe you helped people who had a fire, then one day it happens to you and you’re like ‘I never realized how traumatic or lost you are when it happens.’”

The family stayed at Melissa’s mother’s home in Ellwood City on Tuesday night, and the couple left their daughter with her grandma Wednesday so they could return to the property and deal with the insurance company and other issues.

Ward’s brother set up a fifth-wheel camper beside a garage on the property, which has separate electric plus water.

“Now that’s kind of the plan. You have to do something,” Ward said of his family’s immediate accommodations. “I can cook. I can sleep. I can take a shower.”

The fire marshal said Tuesday afternoon the house is unsafe to enter. Ward peeked in when the firefighters were still on scene.

“I used to be a fireman for Lick Hill years ago, and I know (the house) is going to be on the ground within a week,” Ward said.

He said the metal roof that was installed six or seven years ago is all that’s holding the roof up.

“A brand new roof, and I was going to side (the house) this year,” Ward said. “Then this happened.”

He praised the firefighters who arrived quickly and worked hard to try to save the house, which was purchased along with another nearby house by his grandfather in the 1940s or ’50s.

Ward said the family will not leave the hilltop property his grandfather found so beautiful many years ago.

“We are going to rebuild,” he said. “My family has been here for too long. I ran these hills when I was a kid, and we grew up in the old schoolhouse at the bottom of the hill.”

He is amazed, but not surprised, at the reaction of his neighbors, the Bollinger family, which consists of three families on Vogleyville Road who have been neighbors to the Wards for decades.

Tara Bollinger Smith lives on Vogleyville and could be seen helping the Wards with water, blankets, emotional support and anything else they needed as their home was reduced to an unrecognizable blackened structure Tuesday.

Bollinger is now collecting gift cards, clothing or anything else folks want to donate to the family as they deal with their loss.

“We’re all real tight,” Smith said of the longtime neighbors in the Vogleyville Road area. “Even neighbors across Herman Road said, ‘Can we donate some money?’ Everyone is trying to pitch in and help them.”

She said Walmart cards are very convenient because the Wards can buy food, toiletries, pet food, clothing and other immediate needs there.

Those who wish to donate items or a gift card can call Smith at 724 -712-5966 for drop-off information.

Smith said as larger items are donated, she may have drop-offs made at her office, EXP Realty on Center Avenue, where she is a Realtor and co-owner.

Ward said he and Tara went to school together since first-grade, and their families attended the same church.

“I’m always the type of person who goes out and helps people without asking for anything back, so I’m not surprised my circle is here for me,” Ward said. “It’s how our parents raised us boys. You help anybody you can, and the good Lord will take care of you.”

Capt. Larry Shuler of Herman Volunteer Fire Department said the Butler Bureau of Fire was the first to arrive on the scene, where they found the house fully involved.

Shuler’s crews from Herman arrived shortly after.

He said the age of the home figured into its total loss.

“It’s an older house, which made it harder because older frame construction, (the fire) gets into the walls and spreads to the attic,” Shuler said.

He said Herman and East Butler volunteer fire departments plus the Butler Bureau of Fire were dispatched in the initial call, which was for a porch fire.

When dispatchers sounded the second alarm several minutes later, the home was fully involved and Saxonburg, Buffalo Township and Oneida Valley tankers were dispatched to carry water to the scene.

Firefighters had to carefully back the large tanker trucks up the Ward’s quarter-mile long driveway, which leads from Vogleyville Road to the top of the hill where the home is situated.

“There was no room to turn around up there,” Shuler said. “It was easier to back in so they could pull straight out.

“Plus, a lot of tankers have discharges on the rear of the truck.”

Shuler praised the mutual aid agreements that fire departments in Butler County have with their neighboring fire departments.

“It’s very important, especially in this day and age, with (the number of) volunteers coming down,” he said.

He said Herman relies on the Butler Bureau of Fire — which is the county’s only paid fire department with firefighters always on station — for additional crew at fire scenes.

“It was a tremendous help because they were the first ones there to start the knockdown of the fire,” Shuler said. “All in all, it went well, and everyone worked together to get the job done.”

Trooper DuWayne Baird, the Troop D state police fire marshal, said the cause of the fire remains under investigation.

He estimated damages at about $250,000.