Sixty years ago, Firefighter Donald Blaskovich left a theatre where "The Dark at the Top of the Stairs" was staged to witness an all-too-real living hell.
The 85-year-old FDNY retiree, a member of the now defunct Engine Company 13, is the last firefighter alive to have fought the deadly blaze at the Elkins Paper Company on Wooster St. near West Houston St. on Feb. 14, 1958, in a part of the city once dubbed "Hell's 100 Acres."
It was a heartbreaking Valentine's Day for the FDNY: Two firefighters and four fire patrol officers -- New York Board of Fire Underwriters employees whose job was to run into burning commercial buildings to salvage as much equipment and property as they could -- were killed when the building collapsed.