A Minn. collection lost..

[Mr70]

This was posted on another website & thought some on here could possibly shed more light that we can pass on to him.

"I can't verify this yet but maybe someone else can.I just got a call from another and he told me that long time collector Gene Sonnen from the Twin Cities area,lost a building with his collection and hot rods in it over the weekend.What a tradgedy that is!
I don't personally know the man but I've heard stories of his car and memorabilia collection and it sounded impressive.
Any loss of personal possessions to fire is a horrible thing,but to lose a very valuable collection to fire would be very tragic and disheartening to say the least.
My sympathies to Gene."

[AutoInsane]

http://www.oldgas.com/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=171858

"Yes Geno did have a fire but not everything was lost he had insurance and its sounds like his fords will be ok! But still it sucks as a lot of those signs go way back to our early days of collecting!!!"

[Mr70]

This just in from the owner lastnight..

Hi,it's Gene Sonnen here.Yes,I did have a garage fire on Jan.20,2010 and yes,I did lose part of my over 40+ year collection.At the time of the fire I was with friends looking at another collection and received a call from my alarm company notifying me that my garage was on fire.The apparent cause of the fire was a timer that shorted out.I had the timer in the garage to turn on an outside gas pump light.The St Paul fire department showed up and did a great job putting out the fire.Thank you all for your concern, and if I were you I would check out the status of your timers.