Note: In the video, WBAY erroneously reports the buildings at Cedar Grove Resort were not rebuilt. The duplex which exploded and claimed the lives of Patrick and Peggy Higdon has indeed been rebuilt.

CLICK FOR VIDEO — The opening of the Pioneer General Store in Ellison Bay is just another sign that the town is getting back to normal after a propane line caused a deadly explosion just under a year ago.

The explosion happened around 2:30 a.m. of July 10th. Two people were killed in the blast and three buildings were destroyed, including structures on the Cedar Grove Resort and the Pioneer General Store.

The General Store was a Door County landmark, standing for over 100 years before the explosion forced the owners to tear it down.

But today, a new era begins for the store. Residents welcome back what some call the heart of the community.

Potato chip bags are placed on the shelves and some last minute items are price checked. These are sights Carol Newman has waited a difficult year to witness.

“I’m anxious to get started. I’m anxious to give them hugs and just get back into business.”

Although much of what’s inside the building is brand new to the eye, people say the most important aspect of the pioneer store aren’t something you can necessarily see. You have to experience it.

Erin Pugh, an Ellison Bay resident said, “It’s social, it’s convenient, everybody gets together and tells stories.”

Newman said, “That’s what made the store the people, freedom’s everybody had to visit with everybody else. They expected to meet someone else in here, catch up on the daily gossip, the weekly gossip, who’s being good, who’s being bad.”

It’s those things people say brought them here to show their support for Carol and the new life of the Pioneer Store.

John Shafer, another Ellison Bay resident said, “It’s like the heart of the community, really, that’s how people felt when it wasn’t here.”

One of Ellison Bay’s oldest landmarks is set to reopen in about a month.

The Pioneer Store, the only general store in town, was one of three buildings destroyed in a propane explosion last July.

But now crews are working to rebuild the store in the old store’s likeness.

“I remember how much my husband really wanted this store and it kind of encouraged me to go back into it too so that’s why I wanted it to look the same too,” said store owner Carol Newman.

The new Pioneer Store, which contractors hope to have open by early July, does look the same on the outside. The inside, however, will be different.

Green paint will still be on the inside walls, but because of new codes and regulations updated refrigerators and freezers will be installed. The original store had hardwood floors, now there’s tile.

And while Carol Newman expects patrons to comment on the differences, she says the people, not the aesthetics, are what make the store special. “The atmosphere is what makes the store. I don’t think it’s the physical building,” Newman said.

The resurrection of the Pioneer Store to the replica that it is today has not only been exciting for Carol Newman, but it’s something this entire community is really looking forward to.

“It was part of the history of Ellison Bay and with it gone, part of Ellison Bay was missing and now we’re going to put it back as close to the original as we can,” said contractor Carl Carlson.

And since all the work to rebuild the infamous store has been done by local crews, the reopening is going to be even more special for those who shop at the store.

WFRV-TV (Original story with photos here)

(WFRV) ELLISON BAY, Wis. The Liberty Grove Town Board held a special emergency board meeting Friday afternoon regarding the Ellison Bay disaster.

A severed underground liquid propane line caused Monday’s explosions that killed two vacationers, injured seven others, wrecked three buildings and virtually closed down this tiny tourist town in Door County.

The town board has decided to fence-in the Cedar Grove Resort, where two of the three buildings are located, while the investigation continues.

The town will also demolish the third building that was wrecked, the historic Pioneer Store, possibly on Tuesday.

Authorities hope to reopen Highway 42 by Wednesday

The Door County Sheriff’s Department says residents have been allowed back into their homes, and most of the businesses are back open. The power has been restored to most areas except for the Cedar Grove Resort. And local traffic is being allowed into Ellison Bay as far as the Mink River Basin Supper Club.

Chief Deputy Gary Behling said the severed line was on private property and serviced two of the buildings at the Cedar Grove Resort where two of the explosions occurred.

The severed line was connected to at least one of two 1,000-gallon tanks on the property, Behling said.

“It fed the Cedar Grove Resort,” he said. “They have capped the line that was damaged. They continue to test the area around the explosion sites.”

A contractor for Wisconsin Public Service Corp. worked in the area last week burying some electrical cable with a drilling machine, and the propane line was apparently broken during that work, Behling said.

Marilyn Bazett-Jones, a spokeswoman for WPS in Green Bay, said private propane lines are not marked by Diggers Hotline and only the owner would know where they are buried. The statewide Diggers Hotline, supported by public utilities and municipalities, helps people make sure excavation work doesn’t hit buried utility lines.

“There are a lot of questions,” Bazett-Jones said. “The nature of the work is under investigation. We are cooperating fully.”

Some holes are being dug in efforts to ventilate any gas that may remain trapped underground, Behling said.

Investigators still were trying to determine how the gas flowed underground, ending up in some buildings that exploded and skipping others that were unharmed, and the sequence of the explosions, Behling said.

Behling did not know how much propane may have leaked out. Liquid propane becomes a gas when it is released into the air.

The blasts, about 2:30 a.m. Monday, collapsed the Pioneer Store, a landmark and the only grocery store in this unincorporated village of about 150 residents near the tip of the Door County peninsula, and damaged the resort’s maintenance building that included several living units.

The explosion burned down the resort cabin where Patrick M. Higdon, 49, and Margaret Brooks Higdon, 45, of Bloomfield, Hills, Mich., were killed. They were vacationing with other family members, including three children, two of whom were seriously injured, authorities said.