Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, December 15, 1993                   TAG: 9312150121
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: ADRIENNE PETTY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

FIRE TAKES HOME, TREE . . . MEMORIES

"Bless his heart, he thought we were playing a joke on him," said Vickie Morrison, Atkins' aunt.

When he discovered no one else was laughing, Atkins burst into tears.

"I don't have nothing left," Atkins told her. His collection of baseball cards and the trophies he had won for baseball and basketball were lost in the flames.

Along with the Christmas surprises Atkins' mother had stashed away for him, the fire claimed the family's Christmas tree, which they had put up and decorated the night before.

The mobile home on Virginia 618 in the Figsboro section of southern Franklin County was gutted by fire Tuesday morning, not long after Atkins and his parents, Kenneth and Brenda Coleman, had left for work and school.

"No one was home, thank goodness," Morrison said.

Ben Cook, the county's deputy fire marshal, said firefighters received word of the blaze shortly after 9 a.m. from a neighbor. The origin of the fire hadn't been determined, but Cook plans to investigate it today.

Morrison, Brenda Coleman's sister, said the family will stay either with her family in Martinsville or with Kenneth Coleman's mother in Bassett.

"She's upset enough just worried about getting some clothes on the child's back," Morrison said. "People where I work are taking up money to get him some presents so he'll have some kind of Christmas."

Brenda Coleman's co-workers at Pluma Inc. in Martinsville, where she sews clothes, are setting up boxes in the company's canteen for food donations, and company executives are making plans to give the family clothes, said Julia Minter, personnel manager.

Brenda Coleman doesn't even have a winter coat, because she left home that morning wearing a sweater.

Morrison said her sister is especially sad over the loss of sentimental items that belonged to their deceased mother, who originally owned the mobile home, and brother, who was killed by a drunken driver.

Brenda Coleman said that members of the community who want to help can call the Franklin County chapter of the Red Cross.