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Elvis Presley's 'Loving You' album. Image courtesy of LiveAuctioneers Archive and Lesle Hindman Auctioneers.

Fire destoys home in upstate N.Y., spares Elvis museum

Tom Hoepf
Tom Hoepf
Elvis Presley's 'Loving You' album. Image courtesy of LiveAuctioneers Archive and Lesle Hindman Auctioneers.
Elvis Presley’s ‘Loving You’ album. Image courtesy of LiveAuctioneers Archive and Lesle Hindman Auctioneers.

DE PEYSTER, N.Y. (AP) – A northern New York couple has lost their home to a fire, but their massive collection of Elvis Presley memorabilia remains intact.

The Watertown Daily Times reports that Robert and Shirley Gagnon’s home in the St. Lawrence County town of De Peyster was destroyed by a fire last Friday night.

Robert Gagnon, a 70-year-old woodworker, managed to prevent the flames from spreading to the couple’s Memories of Elvis museum next door by using a hose to keep the building doused with water.

No one was injured.

The newspaper reports that the couple’s 15-year-old museum contains 50,000 Elvis mementos that fill a five-room modular home with posters, magazines, dolls and other items.

Located at the end of a dead-end rural road, the museum gets only a few dozen visitors a year.

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Information from: Watertown Daily Times, http://www.watertowndailytimes.com

Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

AP-WF-12-28-11 1208GMT

ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE

Elvis Presley's 'Loving You' album. Image courtesy of LiveAuctioneers Archive and Lesle Hindman Auctioneers.
Elvis Presley’s ‘Loving You’ album. Image courtesy of LiveAuctioneers Archive and Lesle Hindman Auctioneers.