An online fundraiser has been launched to help a family displaced earlier this month by a fire that destroyed their historic home.

Members of the Stevens family were asleep in their Farrell Road home [naviga:u]on Tuesday, May 7, [/naviga:u][naviga:u]when a fire broke out[/naviga:u]. One person, Charles (C.J.) Stevens, Jr, suffered burns severe enough to require hospitalization; two other people were able to escape the house without injury, including homeowner Lori Stevens.

All five of Newtown’s fire companies responded to the fire, which took at least an hour to knock down, and it took another two hours to fully douse the fire and begin overhaul at the scene.

Ryan Bosworth and Lauren Johnson have launched a gofundme campaign to help the Stevens family. Mr Bosworth is dating Ms Stevens’s daughter, Sable; Ms Johnson is the fiancée of Ms Stevens’s son, Alex.

As of late afternoon May 22, the fund had raised $2,305 thanks to donations by 24 people.

The [naviga:u]Newtown CT House Fire Recovery Effort[/naviga:u] is hoping to raise $20,000. Funds raised, according to the fund’s description, will be used to cover medical expenses, the replacement costs for clothing, food, and monthly expenses.

“It is difficult to put a total cost of the damages sustained, as the house was full of antique relics,” Mr Bosworth and Ms Johnson noted in the fund’s story. The majority of personal belongings were lost in the fire, they mentioned, “with C.J.’s room being in direct path of the fire, he lost all of his belongings, including clothes.”

Ryan and Sable, who live in Rhode Island, were in Newtown shortly after 8 am the morning of the fire.

“We got a phone call from Sable’s brother,” Mr Bosworth told The Newtown Bee last week. “Sable was asleep, but he called me and told me to wake her up.”

Ryan was the one who broke the news to his sister that their family home was on fire.

Firefighters had cleared from the scene by then, but Fire Marshal Rich Frampton and Deputy Fire Marshal Steve Murphy had begun their investigation by that time into what had sparked the fire that destroyed the circa 1900 dwelling.

When Mr Bosworth and Ms Stevens arrived at the house where Ms Stevens had grown up, they were in “complete shock,” according to Mr Bosworth. The 946-square-foot home had been constructed in 1900. By daybreak the morning of the fire, much of the southeastern section of the house had burned away. The roof had burned through, and a few scorched rafters offered stark evidence of the intensity of the fire just a few hours earlier.

The northwestern side of the house fared a little better, at least from an exterior view, but the damage was still obvious in the daylight. Charred debris from the inside of the house was on the lawn, and the fire marshals were removing additional debris during their work.

In the side yard, a pair of lawn chairs had been placed to face toward the west. Located within yards of the structure, the backs of the chairs were melted from the heat.

Speaking to The Newtown Bee on May 16, a few days after the gofundme campaign was launched, Mr Bosworth was pleased with the initial start of the fundraising.

“It’s impressive that people can come together to support a cause,” he said. Donations had ranged from $25 to $500 per person at that time. “Anything helps,” he said.

Mr Bosworth also said that as of that afternoon, the family was doing about as well as they could.

“The family is, overall, good,” he said. “Lori’s back to work, and us kids are doing what we can to make sure everything is going in the right direction.”

The gofundme campaign can be found at gofundme.com/f/newtown-ct-house-fire-recovery-effort.