CHICAGO (CBS) — Chicago firefighters and police are investigating a fire in a Burnside home that ended with a 70-year-old man dead. 

Family called him kind, a great cook, and a selfless family man. 

The fire broke out on the first floor of a two-story coach house at 640 E. 89th Place. 

Inside the home a large family thrived. Now they are trying to understand how their 70-year-old father, brother and friend died so suddenly after surviving so much. 

“He beat cancer not once but twice,” family said of Howard Criddell. 

Criddell lived in the coach house behind his mother’s home, which they say was always full of family. 

“He was a family man,” his daughter, Danielle Newton, said. “He was definitely a family man, And he would take care of anybody. He would take in everybody.” 

Newton lost her dad Sunday. She was at her grandmother’s house in front of the home when the fire started.

“We just thought it was a false alarm,” she said. “We were in here making plans, helping my grandmother make plans and just something totally different.”

It’s a loss so fresh it doesn’t feel real. 

“I asked him to be my valentine. It’s just unreal.” 

Criddell was already gone by the time emergency crews arrived. 

“Just gotta take it one day at a time,” his daughter said. 

Family says this is the second fire to happen at the home. Last time he wasn’t at the house when it happened. 

“There was a fire that stemmed in the walls and we had to regut it,” his brother said. “We’re puzzled as far as what actually really happened because we don’t have answers, and that’s what’s really getting me, and a know my daughter and my niece, because we all loved him.” 

Both the Chicago Fire Department and the Chicago Police Department are investigating. 

It’s not clear what caused the fire.