A local family is reeling after their Harcum home of more than nearly 40 years was destroyed by fire early Monday morning. Though they lost all of their possessions and the home he built by his own hands, James “Tom” Cook and his wife Marie are thankful that they escaped the blaze unharmed along with their son, Randy, who alerted the couple to the fire just before 3:30 a.m.

Randy, who was also staying in the home on Harcum Road, hadn’t been in bed for very long when he had a hankering for some homemade brownies his sister, Karen Harris, had made and brought from her home next door. “I heard something and smelled something funny,” Randy said.

After going through a fire before when he lived in Maryland, he recognized the odor of burning material and immediately went to scope out the house and see what was going on. “When I put my hand on the screened door to go out to the front porch, I burnt my hand,” he said. And that’s when he noticed ...