It was May 16, 1979.
There was no warning to prepare anyone for what would happen that afternoon until a loud crash, screams and a phrase uttered amid the confusion forever altered the history of a Puerto Rican family in Hartford, Connecticut.
“Julito is dead.”
Nearly five decades have passed since then, but Mayra Lozada Guzmán still remembers the scene vividly, as though time had not moved far enough to erase it.
“I can’t believe so many years have passed and I’m still crying,” she said, unable to hold back tears as she began the interview with El Nuevo Día in her home in New Britain.
Her younger brother, Julio “Julito” César Lozada Guzmán, was 12 years old when the roof of an abandoned garage collapsed on top of him behind a deteriorated property on Center Street in the Clay Hill neighborhood.
They were a family of seven who had moved from Caguas to Connecticut about five years earlier amid severe economic hardship.
“My father lost his job at the mattress factory back home and my mother also lost her job at the regional hospital. We were struggling so much that we relied on PRERA (the now innactive Puerto Rico Emergency Relief Administration),” Mayra recalled.
The decision to move to Connecticut — where Puerto Ricans now make up 8% of the population, or more than 300,000 residents — came through an aunt who already lived there.
“She told us things were better here and that they helped people through welfare,” she said.
Mayra was 13 years old. Julito was barely six. When they arrived, nine people lived together in a one-bedroom apartment. “We practically slept on top of one another,” she said.
That was the reality for many Puerto Rican families who had begun migrating to Connecticut following the economic crisis left by World War II, when tobacco farms in the state heavily recruited rural laborers from the island.
As the oldest child, Mayra quickly took on the responsibility of accompanying her mother to appointments and errands that required translation. In that environment, Julito attended school and grew up as an energetic, sociable and helpful child.
“He loved getting into mischief, going fishing with my dad, and he was always looking out for older people,” his sister said.
What happened that day
On the afternoon of May 16, 1979, Julito was playing tag with three friends — Porfirio Rivera, Manuel Marrero and Julio Quiñones — inside an abandoned garage at 18-20 Center Street.
According to reports reviewed by El Nuevo Día, Julito and Manuel were hitting a wall with a wooden stick when they began hearing cracking sounds.
The boys ran, but Julito — who was holding Manuel’s hand — tripped and fell into a hole moments before the collapse. The others managed to escape.
Mayra was already married and no longer lived nearby. Her mother, Nilda Guzmán Torres, and sisters Nilda, Alba and Elva lived on Albany Avenue above Ernie’s Market, where Julito worked bagging groceries “to earn a few dollars.”
His father, Genaro Lozada Román, no longer lived there after the couple divorced.
Mayra remembers arriving home from work and hearing screams and the doorbell ringing insistently.
“It was my mother. She said, ‘Julito is dead.’ I thought she was being dramatic.”
What happened over the next hour would transform the conversation about emergency response in Hartford, where Puerto Ricans now make up 44% of the city’s residents.
Failures in the response
It was approximately 6:15 p.m. when the garage roof collapsed on Julito and his friends. Hartford Fire Department records show the first emergency call was not received until 6:55 p.m. — 40 minutes later.
According to the call transcript, a person with “imperfect English” reported a problem at “15 Fairmount Street and a bunch of kids, one is missing.” Fairmount Street borders the 18-20 Center Street property.
The responding unit arrived at 6:56 p.m. Witnesses interviewed later said only one firefighter, Michael Hotham, got off the truck and briefly looked over the rubble. Lt. William Donelly allegedly told him, “Let’s go, there’s nothing we can do here.”
At 7:02 p.m., the unit was logged back at the station on Main Street, about three blocks away. That means firefighters took roughly seven minutes to arrive, step out of the truck, walk about 246 feet to the collapse site, look around, return to the truck and drive back to headquarters.
“The people there didn’t speak English, and the firefighters didn’t speak Spanish, so the firefighters couldn’t understand them,” Mayra recalled.
That testimony about the language barrier matched accounts from neighbors interviewed at the time. However, investigators documented inconsistencies between Lt. Donelly’s version of events and statements from firefighters William Kamm and James Ring, who said they were never informed a child was trapped.
In his statement, firefighter Hotham said everyone got off the truck and that among the seven or eight people present, no one “said anything” or appeared visibly distressed.
Minutes later, police officer Bruce Tschoffer was dispatched to Albany Avenue on another matter when neighborhood children alerted him to the collapse. Tschoffer contacted the fire department, which told him the scene had already been checked and no one was there.
It was a local resident, Charles Currie, alongside the officer, who first located a shoe.
“Julito loved karate, and during the summer he always wore karate shoes. That was the shoe they found, and that’s how they knew it was him,” Mayra remembered.
Firefighters returned at 7:24 p.m. for a second time. By then, tensions between the community and authorities were evident, and police requested that firefighters stay back.
Julito was taken to Saint Francis Hospital, arriving alive at 7:39 p.m. He was pronounced dead at 8:10 p.m. The official cause of death: skull fractures, severe brain concussion and chest fractures.
“If they had pulled him out the first time, he would still be alive,” Mayra said mournfully.
Documented negligence
The investigation, led by attorneys Jeffrey Van Kirk and Víctor M. Agrait, concluded that the tragedy was not solely the result of failures in emergency response. It also exposed years of negligence surrounding a structure that Hartford’s Department of Licenses and Inspections had flagged as dangerous since 1925.
In 1973, the garage’s owner at the time, Louis Goldschmidt, was notified of severe Housing Code violations due to the deteriorated condition of the property, which officials described as “a public health issue.”
A housing inspector even issued an arrest warrant against Goldschmidt for repeatedly failing to comply with orders, and the case was referred to a special prosecutor for legal action.
Although the property was declared unfit for occupancy and repeatedly placed on city demolition lists, action was postponed.
In July 1975, ownership was transferred to S&L Contractors Inc., a company in which Goldschmidt was an executive. In 1976, the city repaired the property under a government contract and later placed a lien against it after the owner failed to pay.
It was not until May 17, 1979 — one day after Julito’s death — that the structure was finally demolished.
A report by Buck and Buck Engineering revealed that between 1,000 and 2,000 bricks had been removed over time for resale or reuse, critically weakening a support pillar between the fifth and sixth columns of the structure.
“I had never seen my father cry before, and I thought my mother was going to have a heart attack. She was gone emotionally. She would sit on the balcony staring at the park where Julito played baseball. That’s what slowly killed her,” Mayra said.
Mayra handled all the funeral arrangements and wanted “everything to happen quickly.” The funeral took place three days later. She recalled being so busy that she had not cried — until she saw in the newspaper a photograph of the hole where Julito died.
The birth of the Julio Lozada Foundation
Over the years, grief turned into purpose.
In 2013, Mayra established the Julio Lozada Foundation, inspired in part by how little Hispanic firefighters in Hartford knew about her brother’s story.
Through the organization, she has awarded college scholarships, organized community service events, given away bicycles and toys to children, held softball tournaments and more.
“For me, all of that was a way to keep him alive, and seeing children happy was like seeing Julito,” Mayra said.
Today, Hispanics make up about 35% of Hartford’s fire department and 22.3% of the police force. Julito’s death helped drive the hiring of Hispanic personnel at a time when there were none in 1979.
“We are proud to lead one of the most diverse departments in the country, with a workforce composed of 35% Hispanics, 32% African Americans, 32% whites and 1% Native Americans. Those numbers are the direct result of the reforms initiated by Julio Lozada,” said Puerto Rican firefighter Mario Oquendo, Jr., a district chief with the Hartford Fire Department.
For Mayra, that progress confirms that her brother’s story remains relevant.
That same year, under the leadership of Hartford’s first Puerto Rican fire chief, Edward Casares, the Latino Firefighters Society dedicated a plaque to Julio Lozada as “the boy who transformed the city’s public safety.”
The plaque stands at the entrance of the Public Safety Complex.
“We honor Julito not only during ceremonies, but as a teaching tool in the recruit academy and cadet programs to emphasize the importance of community and representation. His legacy is also honored through the annual Hartford Firefighters Local 760 softball game, which raises money for the Julio Lozada Scholarship, ensuring his name continues providing opportunities to Hartford students today,” Oquendo said.
Likewise, the Clay Hill neighborhood is home to Lozada Park, named in his honor. The lot where the tragedy occurred remains vacant.
“If I could tell him something today, it would be that I love him very much,” Mayra said emotionally.
