A dog died and eleven people survived an early morning fire Sunday at the Freedom Center at 633 Gardiner Road in Dresden, officials said. An investigator from the State Fire Marshal’s Office worked at the scene and will return Monday or Tuesday to keep looking for a cause, Dresden Fire Chief Steve Lilly said Sunday afternoon.

The center, housed in a building that has served as a restaurant, inn and function hall over the years, is a transitional home, according to interviews Sunday and Wiscasset Newspaper files.

The roof collapsed and the building is likely a total loss, Lilly said at the scene around 11 a.m. as firefighters continued putting out hot spots. A Richmond firefighter was not feeling well during the firefighting effort and was taken to a hospital to be checked out, Lilly said.

Firefighters from Wiscasset, Edgecomb, Boothbay, Alna, Woolwich, Bowdoin, Bowdoinham, Pittston, Gardiner, Richmond and Farmingdale helped Dresden fight the fire, which was under control a couple of hours into the effort, Lilly said shortly before 11 a.m. as the state investigator continued to seek a cause.

The dog’s remains were found inside the building, Lilly said.

Lilly was the first Dresden firefighter on scene. The back of the building was on fire and the fire was at the roof, he said. Eleven occupants were already outside, but at first two other people remained unaccounted for, the chief said. So firefighters went in and had enough visibility to do a primary search, finding no one. It was then learned that the two other occupants had not returned the night before the fire.

Asked if there was some risk to firefighters going in when they did, Lilly said: “Yes, but when there’s people we think might be inside, that’s what we’re trained to do is get them out.”

The Red Cross got the center’s occupants temporary housing at an Augusta hotel, Lilly said.

 An excavator from the Jack Shaw firm was used to help the Fire Marshal’s Office examine the scene, Lilly said.

Alna Fire Department was paged first to Wiscasset’s fire station then on to the scene, Wiscasset Deputy Fire Chief John Merry said. According to Dresden and Wiscasset officials, Newcastle and Westport provided station coverage.

Lilly said that, as with any large fire these days, mutual aid was important to putting out Sunday’s fire. He gave particular credit to Gardiner providing its ladder truck. The fire would have been a much bigger job to put out without it, he said.

The call in town was Dresden’s second one early Sunday. A couple of hours earlier, the department was called to Woolwich for what was thought to be a structure fire, but turned out to be a chimney fire, Lilly said. Dresden was turned around while still en route; Lilly went home and had just gotten back to sleep for about 15 minutes when the department was paged out to the fire at the center.

Dresden selectmen granted the Freedom Center a business permit on July 27, 2015, according to the newspaper’s files.  The center operates as a nonprofit and provides transitional housing for people with addictions or other physical or mental illnesses, an article stated at the time; the center opened in 2014 with a provisional permit, the article stated.

Dresden Historical Society member and past president and lifelong Dresden resident Eleanor Everson said the building dates back roughly 40 years and was first a restaurant and motel, then later was used by a church group from Dresden Mills for several years. “It’s too bad to see a building that’s in use burn,” Everson said in a phone interview.

“It’s a terrible loss, devastating,” said Woolwich’s Wally Staples. He serves on the Dresden Fire Department and was one of the first members on the scene, he said. And until about four weeks ago, Staples, pastor of the Wiscasset Church of the Nazarene, had been helping provide worship services and food from the Wiscasset church to the Freedom Center, he said. Then a staff member at the center said they were going to try taking a break from the church’s help, Staples said in a phone interview Sunday afternoon.