On Memorial Day 1969, fire destroyed the Hechinger's building supply store on South Washington Street in Falls Church.
It was one of the biggest blazes of the 1960s for the Falls Church Volunteer Fire Department and the Arlington County Fire Department.
The flames - from a store stocked with lumber, paint and other flammables - were visible for a mile or more at the height of the inferno.
The Hechinger Co., founded in 1911, was a mainstay of the Washington area for decades.
The company went into a state of decline in the 1990s, declared bankruptcy and closed in 1999.
