He is the guy with a generator and garage full of ladders and wheel barrels and tractors and chainsaws. He is the guy who ignores evacuation orders and stays behind because he wants to be useful.
All day every day since the fires broke out a week ago, LemMon, who lives on a quiet street in Glen Ellen, a few blocks off of Highway 12, has been taking orders from evacuees. He feeds neighbors’ farm animals and house pets. He documents damage for those who have not made it back home. He picks up surviving lawn decor and furniture that could be stolen.
He also looks out for possible looters. On Sunday he stopped a reporter wandering through the wreckage to check credentials before pulling the reporter along for a round of neighborhood errands.
“We are in a feed-the-animal mode,” he said.
The fire ripped through Glen Ellen and other Wine Country towns early Monday morning, giving many residents little to no time to flee. While Glen Ellen was largely spared, many homes were lost. The area was still under mandatory evacuation orders Sunday, but there were chores to do.
LemMon, an attorney in Sonoma County, fed some chickens at a property owned by Rebecca Bailey, a psychologist. He then went up to Quarryhill, an Asian botanical garden where a friend lives. He fed one barn cat, Cookie, while leaving food outside for a second cat, Misty, who has not been seen since the fire.
“Misty is on the run,” LemMon said.
He fed another neighbor’s koi fish and brought home a swinging chair — hung from a tree — that was one of the few things to survive at another home.
LemMon was at his own house with wife and twin 12-year-old boys when the fire started.
After helping them evacuate to the town of Sonoma, he went back to protect his ranch. He managed to stamp out the embers that landed on his property and pumped water from a neighbor’s hot tub to help save their house.
“We’re all a little a little traumatized,” he said.
Dozens of homes were destroyed in LemMon’s neighborhood. His side of the block was OK - only one house burned. Across the street, all but one home was reduced to ashes - leaving just brick chimneys, twisted metal remnants of lawn furniture and scorched cars. From one of the chimneys standing in a pile of rubble hung an American flag and a message: “Looters will be shot.”
“It’s apocalyptic,” LemMon said. “And random. But some people got lucky — me included.”
Staff writer Jill Tucker contributed to this story.
J.K. Dineen is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jkdineen@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @sfjkdineen
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