75 Letter 1992 75 Columbus Ave.
Northampton, Mass.
Dec. 17 , 1992
peter J. McErlain
Board of Health
210 Main St.
Northampton, Mass.
Dear sir' 11 in re
I am in receipt of your notice of Dec. years to
allegedly dirty smoke emissions. I answer stefiveoye
the day of the date of another complaint p a
by you on behalf of anonymous callers or caller who claimed
I was burning trash at night and generally smelling up the
neighborhood. among other statements, a
In reply. I sent to you. haw
description of my little stove, how it is unbaffled;
it needs tending every 45 minutes or so; how, if one
stands at the proper angle one can see flames even when
it is closed; and how adjustable vents in the fire door
are usually - always - open.
Well, nothing has changed. The chimney had its annual
cleaning. I know intimately the wood it' s been working on
this fall is at least 11/2 years old.
So, it' s difficult for me to see the problem. It' s
hours of operation are sporadic. Might it be that the
time of your observations - by the way, does that mean it
was dirty for only 20 minutes or was it dirty presumably
before and after and that was the
i decnecessary
eobservati n
period to establish same? tt the starting o the dying oat of a fire? I don't know' I
since operation.
am not precise enough to keep a log (ha ha) of its op
2.
I know I can safely assume that your observers no
longer, as happened in one famous case I 'm sure you
remember, mistake the gas heater exhaust for the smokestack.
They are side by side* and similar in appearance,
is taller than the other.
Working only from memory, it seems to me that Dec. 11
was the last of that series of clear cold days we had
prior to the storm, but I may be wrong.
In any case, I await your return inspection, assuming it
has not already taken place. You may have to come back a
few times because, as I said, the stove is by no means in
operation all the time.
It's too bad these things have to be done on the sly,
though I can understand the reason I suppose.
/,g request thought would it be possiblekfor kyour the
person to, if he or she finds a problem, a
door and invite me out to see it? I'm not against the
rules and I don't want to cause a problems I am violating
having difficulty seeing how I can be routinely
them.
Sincerely.
tgayir
John D. Bart
586-7920