CORINTH — The firefighters and heroic citizens, including four people who saved lives during the Feb. 11 fire that gutted three downtown buildings, will be honored Saturday.

The community appreciation day is being held to thank the people who helped during and after the fire that destroyed the Densmore building on Main Street and two other nearby downtown buildings.

“Sixty-plus people will be given certificates of appreciation,” village Mayor Bradley Winslow said Wednesday.

The Corinth Community Appreciation Day will start at 10 a.m. Saturday in the Corinth firehouse on Route 9N. It had been planned for March 1 but was postponed because of bad weather.

Four people from Rocco’s pizzeria and restaurant on Main Street will be given special honors.

“They saw smoke coming out of the building, they went to the building and got people out,” Winslow said.

Those honorees are the eatery’s co-owners, Eric Johr and Brian Greggoire, along with employee Shawn Lescault and customer Ken Burke.

“They actually kicked in [apartment] doors,” Winslow said of their actions during the fire. “They didn’t have a lot of time.”

The awards to be given to these four citizens say they went “above and beyond” the call of duty, performing “heroic efforts during the downtown Corinth fire of Feb. 11, 2008.”

It took 11 fire departments, including the Corinth Volunteer Fire Department, to quell the blaze that started late on Monday, Feb. 11, when the temperature was four degrees below zero, according to Corinth Fire Chief Andrew Kelley.

“I figure we pumped over 1 million gallons of water onto the fire,” Kelley said.

The owners of White’s True Value store opened up so they could provide firefighters with dry gloves, Kelley said.

“Our gloves were soaked,” Kelley said. The True Value provided dry, warm gloves to firefighters on the bitter cold night.

Kelley said that, miraculously, there were no injuries to firefighters nor to any of the people living in the buildings that burned.

The American Red Cross has helped the apartment tenants find new housing.

At first the cause of the blaze was thought to be a faulty furnace in the Densmore, or Woodworks, building.

But Ed Tremblay, Saratoga County’s fire coordinator, said Wednesday insurance company investigators brought excavation equipment to the fire scene last week. He said the furnace was dug from the basement of the building and was found to be relatively clean and not the fire’s cause.

“We may not be able to name the cause,” Tremblay said.

The Densmore building was built in the late 1800s, Winslow said.

Winslow said state inspectors say there could be asbestos in the fire debris.

“The property owners are getting estimates to remove the demolition debris,” Winslow said. He said the asbestos issue is slowing down cleanup efforts.

“It still looks the same as it did after the fire,” Winslow said about the Main Street block.

But he believes the area will be cleaned up “fairly soon.” Building owners want to rebuild, if possible.

Among the guests expected to attend the appreciation day include state Assemblywoman Teresa Sayward, Michael Mansion from state Sen. Hugh Farley’s office and, possibly, U.S. Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand or her district director, Michael Russo.

The program starts at 10 a.m. but the award ceremony won’t be held until 11 a.m. Light refreshments will be served after the ceremony.