OLD TOWN – Workers were back Wednesday making muffins and other bakery items at LaBree’s Bakery after a fire the night before sent smoke throughout the wholesale bakery operation and prompted the evacuation of about 40 people.

“There was fairly heavy smoke throughout the building,” Old Town Deputy Fire Chief James Lavoie said Wednesday.

The fire damaged one of two large ovens used by LaBree’s, which operates around the clock six days a week to produce baked goods sold to schools, military installations and in grocery stores and supermarkets across the country, according to information from the company.

Repairs are under way on the oven and the company was allowed to resume baking, using the second oven, at 2 p.m. Wednesday, about 14 hours after Old Town firefighters were called to the Gilman Falls Avenue business.

A company official said it wasn’t clear what impact the delay caused by the fire will have, but he said the company produces some of its goods ahead of time in anticipation of orders and that supply may be used to offset the time that was lost.

“We will be playing catch up with ourselves,” said Jay MacDonald, operations manager.

Insurance adjusters were still assessing the damage to the oven and losses of product that had not been in freezers, as well as the cost of cleaning up.

Lavoie credited workers at the bakery plant with helping to contain the fire early on with fire extinguishers and also with realizing when the fire was beyond their means, quickly evacuating the facility and calling the fire department.

“They did exactly as they should have done,” said Lavoie, noting the initial effort by employees to put out the fire slowed it. “I can’t praise them enough for the job that they did.”

The plant had completed an order of blueberry muffins and was switching over to another order when food debris caught and built up at the end of the 60-foot-long oven was ignited by the gas-fed burners at the bottom.

Some of the rollers that carry the baked goods through the oven were warped, but the fire was kept to that small area.

“Where it started is where it stopped,” Lavoie said.

Smoke was another matter. It spread out in the building and required some food to be thrown out and required cleaning. Anything that had touched the conveyor also had to be cleaned, Lavoie said.

Old Town firefighters were assisted on the scene by firefighters from Orono and Lavoie said firefighters cleared the scene about 2:30 a.m.

LaBree’s has been a familiar name for decades and had its start in 1948 by brothers Almond and Pat LaBree. The company has grown over those years, but in 1982 had a setback when fire destroyed much of its operations.