32 chapters
8 hour read
Selected Chapters
32 chapters
Chicago's Awful Theater Horror
Chicago's Awful Theater Horror
By THE SURVIVORS AND RESCUERS WITH INTRODUCTION BY BISHOP FALLOWS Presenting a Vivid Picture, both by Pen and Camera, of One of the Greatest Fire Horrors of Modern Times. Embracing a Flash-Light Sketch of the Holocaust, Detailed Narratives by Participants in the Horror, Heroic Work of Rescuers, Reports of the Building Experts as to the Responsibility for the Wholesale Slaughter of Women and Children, Memorable Fires of the Past, etc., etc. PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED WITH VIEWS OF THE SCENE OF DEATH
1 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
INTRODUCTION.
INTRODUCTION.
By the Rt. Rev. Samuel Fallows , D.D., LL.D. When Chicago was burning, a little girl in a christian home in a neighboring city stamped her foot indignantly on the floor and said: "Why doesn't God put out the fire?" The cry of many an agonized heart, beating in children of a larger growth, has been: "Why doesn't a God of wisdom and love prevent such an awful occurrence as the Iroquois fire?" "I have lost all faith in God," said a dear friend of mine, as its full meaning began to break upon him. W
13 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
MEMORIAL PRAYER.
MEMORIAL PRAYER.
The Rt. Rev. Samuel Fallows wrote this prayer for Chicago on its appointed day of mourning. It is a prayer for all mourners of all creeds: "O God, our Heavenly Father, we pray for an unshaken faith in Thy goodness as our hearts are bowed in anguish before Thee. Come with Thy touch of healing to those who are suffering fiery pain. Open wide the gates of Paradise to the dying. Comfort with the infinite riches of Thy grace the bereaved and mourning ones. Forgive and counteract all our sins of omiss
33 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
MEMORIAL HYMN.
MEMORIAL HYMN.
Bishop Muldoon selected as the one familiar hymn most deeply expressive of the city's mourning, "Lead, Kindly Light," which he declared should be the united song of all Chicagoans on Memorial Day....
15 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
POEM BY A CHILD VICTIM.
POEM BY A CHILD VICTIM.
The following poem, written by Walter Bissinger, a boy victim of the Iroquois Theater fire, fifteen years old, was composed two years ago, in honor of the tenth anniversary of the youthful poet's uncle and aunt, Mr. and Mrs. Max Pottlitzer, of Lafayette, Ind., whose son Jack, aged ten, perished with his cousin in the terrible disaster: HAVE A THOUGHT. ...
35 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
VERDICT OF CORONER'S JURY.
VERDICT OF CORONER'S JURY.
From the testimony presented to us we, the jury, find the following were the causes of said fire: Grand drapery coming in contact with electric flood or arc light, situated on iron platform on the right hand of stage, facing the auditorium. City laws were not complied with relating to building ordinances regulating fire-alarm boxes, fire apparatus, damper or flues on and over the stage and fly galleries. We also find a distinct violation of ordinance governing fireproofing of scenery and all woo
5 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER I.
THE STORY OF THE FIRE. No disaster, by flood, volcano, wreck or convulsion of nature has in recent times aroused such horror as swept over the civilized world when on December 30, 1903, a death-dealing blast of flame hurtled through the packed auditorium of the Iroquois theater, Chicago, causing the loss of nearly 600 lives of men, women and children, and injuries to unknown scores. Strong words pale and appear meaningless when used in describing the full enormity of this disaster, which has no
24 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
FIRST AID TO THE INJURED AND CARE FOR THE DEAD. On the heels of the firemen came the police, intent on the work of rescue. Chief O'Neill and Assistant Chief Schuettler ordered captains from a dozen stations to bring their men, and then they rushed to the theater and led the police up the stairs to the landing outside the east entrance to the first balcony. The firemen, rushing blindly up the stairs in the dense pall of smoke, had found their path suddenly blocked by a wall of dead eight or ten f
21 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
TAKING AWAY AND IDENTIFYING THE DEAD. In drays and delivery wagons they carried the dead away from the Iroquois theater ruins. The sidewalk in front of the playhouse and Thompson's restaurant was completely filled with dead bodies, when it was realized that the patrol wagons and ambulances could not remove the bodies. Then Chief O'Neill and Coroner Traeger sent out men to stop drays and press them into service. Transfer companies were called up on telephone and asked to send wagons. Retail store
12 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
SCENE OF HORROR AS VIEWED FROM THE STAGE. All but one of the 348 members of the "Bluebeard" company escaped, although many had close calls for their lives. Some of the chorus girls displayed great coolness in the face of grave peril. Eddie Foy, who had a thrilling experience, said: "I was up in my dressing room preparing to come on for my turn in the middle of the second act when I heard an unusual commotion on the stage that I knew could not be caused by anything that was a part of the show. I
12 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
EXCITING EXPERIENCES IN THE FIRE. "If you ever saw a field of timothy grass blown flat by the wind and rain of a summer storm, that was the position of the dead at the exits of the second balcony," said Chief of Police O'Neill. "In the rush for the stairs they had jammed in the doorway and piled ten deep; lying almost like shingles. When we got up the stairs in the dark to the front rows of the victims, some of them were alive and struggling, but so pinned down by the great weight of the dead an
10 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
HEROES OF THE FIRE. One of the heroes of the Iroquois theater fire was Peter Quinn, chief special agent of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railroad system, who assisted in saving the lives of 100 or more of the performers. But for the prompt service of Quinn and two citizens who assisted him it is believed that most of the performers would have met the fate of the victims in the theater proper. Mr. Quinn had attended a trial in the Criminal court and in the middle of the afternoon starte
14 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
THE ORIGIN OF THE FIRE—THE ASBESTOS CURTAIN AND THE LIGHTS. The real story of the origin of the fire was told by William McMullen, assistant electrician. He said: "The spot light was completely extinguished at the time of the fire. I am positive of this, because I was working on it. Three feet above my head was the flood light. I noticed the curtain swaying directly above it and suddenly a spark shot up and it was ablaze in a second." McMullen called the attention of his assistant to the flame.
15 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
SUGGESTIONS OF ARCHITECTS AND OTHER EXPERTS AS TO AVOIDING LIKE CALAMITIES. Robert S. Lindstrom, a well known Chicago architect, makes the following suggestions: "It is earnestly requested that the following suggestions be published for the benefit and warning of patrons of public places, also as an aid to city officials, architects and builders, as a possible means of averting another horror such as has been witnessed in the Iroquois theater fire. "Every theater in Chicago is virtually a death
9 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER IX.
THIRTY EXITS, YET HUNDREDS PERISH IN AWFUL BLAST. Those in greatest danger through proximity to the stage did not throw their weight against the mass ahead. Not many died on the first floor, proof of the contention that some restraint existed in this section of the audience. Women were trodden under foot near the rear; some were injured. The most at this point, however, were rescued by the determined rush of the policeman at the entrance and of the doorkeeper and his assistants. The theater had
18 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER X.
HOW THE NEW YEAR WAS USHERED IN. The New Year came to Chicago with muffled drums, two days after the calamity that threw the great metropolis into mourning. Scarcely a sound was heard as 1904 entered. Jan. 1—day of funerals—was received in silence. Streets were almost deserted, even downtown. Men hurried silently along the sidewalks. There were not half a dozen tin horns in the downtown district where ordinarily the blare of trumpets, screech of steam whistles, volleys of shots and the merriment
6 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XI.
A SABBATH OF WOE. A majority of the victims of the fire were laid to rest, however, during the Sabbath succeeding the awful calamity. The main thoroughfares of the benumbed city leading north and west toward the resting places of the dead were crowded with funeral processions, sometimes four and five hearses together showing as white as the snow on the ground, bearing as they did the bodies of children. As one funeral procession after another passed through the streets the numbers of the sorrowi
10 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XII.
WHAT OF THE PLAYERS? Never before in the history of amusements has so excellent an opportunity been afforded to look behind the scenes of the mimic world and study the real life of the actor. To one and all, whether religionist unalterably opposed to the theater and all its ramifications, or the devotee finding life's chiefest pleasures contributed by musician and mummer, the stage looms up a mystic realm, affording more interest and comment than almost any other department of earthly effort. Wh
18 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIII.
OTHER HOLOCAUSTS. Since the time that civilized man first met with fellow man to enjoy the work of the primitive playwright, humanity has paid a toll of human life for its amusements. Oftener than history tells the tiny flicker of a tongue of flame has thrown a gay, laughing audience into a wild, struggling mob, and instead of the curtain which would have been rung down on the comedy on the stage, a pall of black smoke covered the struggles of the living and dying. Of all the theater disasters o
16 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XIV.
STORIES AND NARRATIVES OF THE HOLOCAUST. From two women who sat within a few feet of the stage when the fire broke out in the theater, and who remained calm enough to observe the actual beginning of the holocaust, there came one of the most thrilling and significant stories of that afternoon of panic. Mrs. Emma Schweitzler and Mrs. Eva Katherine Clapp Gibson, of Chicago, were the two women who told this story. They occupied seats in the fifth row of the orchestra circle. Mrs. Schweitzler was the
28 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XV.
CHAPTER XV.
SOCIETY WOMEN AND GIRLS' CLUBS. Miss Charlotte Plamondon, daughter of the vice-president of the Chicago board of education, who waited until the fire had caught in the curtains over the front box, in which she sat, before attempting to get out, related her experience at the Chicago Beach Hotel: "I can't tell you how I escaped the awful fate of others," she said. "I only know that when the flames began to crackle over my head and dart down from the curtains of our box I leaped over the railing of
8 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XVI.
CHAPTER XVI.
EDDIE FOY'S SWORN TESTIMONY. Eddie Foy, whose real name is Edwin Fitzgerald, has faced many audiences under all conditions and circumstances during his stage career of a quarter of a century, during which he rose from a street urchin to the distinction of one of America's most entertaining and unctuous comedians. Never before had such interest centered in his appearance as when on Thursday afternoon, January 7, 1904, he took the witness stand to relate under oath what he knew concerning the cala
12 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XVII.
CHAPTER XVII.
EFFECT OF THE FIRE NEAR AND FAR. Many of the members of the "Mr. Bluebeard, Jr.," company were arrested and retained as witnesses in the trial, on a charge of manslaughter, of Messrs. Davis and Powers, Building Commissioner Williams and the stage manager, electricians and carpenters especially concerned in the manipulation of the lights and curtains. On the Saturday night succeeding the fire Mayor Harrison closed all the theaters in the city, numbering thirty-seven, for a period of two weeks, or
16 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XVIII.
CHAPTER XVIII.
SUGGESTIONS FOR SAFE THEATERS. Clarence J. Root, of Chicago, an assistant of Prof. Cox in the weather bureau, makes the following suggestions in connection with the safe-theater agitation: "Location—All theaters to be in buildings by themselves, like the Illinois and Iroquois. No stores or offices to be located in them. Buildings should be isolated, with wide private or public alleys or courts entirely around the rear and sides. A false wall could be built in front of the side courts where they
10 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XIX.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE SWORN TESTIMONY OF THE SURVIVORS. Scores and scores of witnesses assembled in the little committee rooms and antechambers of the council hall in the great Chicago administrative building, each with his story to add to the story of horror, when the inquest over the dead began on Thursday, January 7, 1904, one week and a day after the disaster. Some were muffled under great rolls of bandages that concealed frightful scars and burns. Others gave no outward indication of the season of terror the
31 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XX.
CHAPTER XX.
LACK OF FIRE SAFEGUARDS. Examination of Robert E. Murray, engineer of the theater, and through that fact, the man in charge of its machinery and mechanical equipment, revealed in a startling way the absolute unpreparation for fire or emergency that characterized the palatial opera house. Coroner, jury and spectators alike were stirred by the confession of absolute disregard for life evinced by the management and the certainty that no thought had been given to the possibility of a fire. The entir
20 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XXI.
CHAPTER XXI.
IRON GATES, DEATH'S ALLY. That two iron gates, securely padlocked, across stairways in the Randolph street entrance, held scores of women and children as prisoners of death at the Iroquois theater fire horror, was the startling evidence secured on Saturday, Jan. 9, ten days after the holocaust by Fire Department Attorney Monroe Fulkerson. In a statement under oath George M. Dusenberry, superintendent of the auditorium of the playhouse, admitted that these gates had remained locked against the fr
8 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XXII.
CHAPTER XXII.
DANCED IN PRESENCE OF DEATH. Heroes and heroines—every one of them—the members of the octette told the coroner how they sang and danced to reassure the vast audience of women and children while death lowered overhead and swept through the scene loft, a chariot of flame. Modestly they revealed the part they played in the catastrophe while billows of flame, death's red banners, menaced their lives. Madeline Dupont, 145 Franklin avenue, New York: "I first saw just a little bit of flame, which was o
8 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XXIII.
CHAPTER XXIII.
JOIN TO AVENGE SLAUGHTER OF INNOCENTS. Ten days after the fire horror, while blood curdling disclosures were coming to light revealing the fate of the penned-in fire victims in a new and more ghastly aspect, and while school officials and pupils gathered to express grief for the 39 teachers and 102 pupils who were gathered in the grim harvest, an inspired movement sprang from the aftermath of woe. It was a cry for justice. In an upper chamber in a towering sky-scraper in the heart of teeming, bu
6 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XXIV.
CHAPTER XXIV.
AWFUL PROPHECY FULFILLED. More than a quarter of a century ago the prophecy was made by the Chicago Times that a terrible calamity was in store for the public on account of the lax provision made for escape from burning theaters. The prophecy was put forth in the guise of a pretended report of such a horror in the issue of that publication for February 13, 1875, and was as follows: "Scores of houses are saddened this beautiful winter morning by the fate which overtook so many unsuspecting people
10 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XXV.
CHAPTER XXV.
LIST OF THE DEAD. A. ADAMEK, JOHN, MRS., 40 years old, Bartlett, Ill. ALEXANDER, LULU B., 36 years old, 3473 Washington boulevard; identified by husband, W. G. Alexander. ALLEN, MRS. MARY S., 27 years old, 5546 Drexel boulevard. ANDERSON, RAGNE, 39 years old, scrubwoman, Iroquois; 229 Grand avenue. ANDREWS, HARRIET, 20 years old, West Superior, Wis. ALEXANDER, BOYER, 8 years old, 475 Washington boulevard; body identified by his father, Dr. W. A. Alexander. ADAMS, MRS. JOHN, Iola, Ill., identifie
29 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter
CHAPTER XXVI.
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE STORY OF THE BURNING OF BALTIMORE. All the world was startled on Sunday, February 7, 1904, just 39 days after the Iroquois theater horror, by another sickening visitation of the fire fiend. This time the devouring element fell upon the city of Baltimore and all but effaced it from the map. Millions upon millions in property were swept away, old established firms annihilated and miles of streets occupied by business houses laid waste. Fortunately this disaster was accompanied by no loss of li
20 minute read
Read Chapter
Read Chapter