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rifljrtii#akt*re-upme#wtaow*Ion,5 OfLn4,dugtowAbout #6# people were killed in ten ( ward the front of tfc# theatre. Two of mtoutaft Wednesday afternoon* during I tbeee doorway# are *t the end of the a tin in the Iroquois theatre, the new* j balcocy, and one being in the center, eat, the larged, and, as far as human] The audience, in its rush for the power could make it, the safest the-J outer air, seems to ha^e chosen, lor atiw to Chicago. Estimates of the | the greater part, toMtoAo toe left ext*w as[ totomd,beyng,eatflyIm*lictbeten aw-rcelug[hetotentiyisndheonliythinngesIT-orm■Bnletieoffn-er6,iisin-fold.sein»d7ieal8-[nx-d-toiri»itITV-l#c*It.1,fl*ftisBtferJitYlt;tr*ni-rfi-i-iite«r*■ndead and injured vary. The police count of dead is 536. The estimateof the newspapers is 663. Eighty-sixof the dead have been positively identified, and ninety-two others are known to be injured.A tew of these people were burned to death by fire, many were suffocated by gas, and scores were trampled to death in the panic that followed ther.mad plunge of the frightened audiencefor the exits.There are bodies lying by dozens iu the undertaking rooms, in the police station and in the hospitals, from which nearly everything that could reveal their identity to those who knew them best is gone.Their clothing is torn to rags or*burned to cinders, and their faces have been mashed into an unrecognizable pulp by the heels of the crowd that trampled them down as they fled for safety.The fire broke out during the second act of the play “Mr. Bluebeard,” which was the first dramatic produc-tion produced in the theatre since its erection. The company, which was very large, escaped to the street, in safety1, nearly all of the members, however, being compelled to flee Into the Bnowy streets with no clothing but their stage costumes. A few members of the company, sustained minor injuries, but none was seriously hurt The accounts of the origin of the fire are conflicting, and none of them certain, but the beBt reason given Is that an electric wire on the lower part of a*piece of drop scenery suddenly broke nnlt;^ was grounded.The fire spread rapidly toward the front of the stage, causing the mem bere of the chorus, who were then en gaged in the performance, to flee to the wings with screams of terror. The fire in itself up to this time was not serious, and possibly could have been checked had not the asbestos ciiftain failed to work.As soon as the fire was discovered, Eddie Foy, the chief comedian of the company, shouted to lower the curtain and this was immediately attempted.It descended about half way and then stuck. The fire thus was given practically a flue, through which a strong^ draft was setting, aided by the doors which had ben thrown open in the front of the theatre. With a roar and a bound the flmee shot through the opening over the heads of the people on the first floor, and, reaching clear up, to those In the first balcony, caught them and burned them to death where they sat.Immediately following this rush of flames there came an explosion, which lifted the entire roof of the theatre ffom its walls, shattering the great skylight into fragments. As soon as the flames first appeared beyond the curtain a man in the rear of the ball shouted “Fire! Fire!” and the entire audience rose as one person and made for the doors. It is believed that the explosion was caused by the flames coming in contact with the gas reser volrs of the theatre, causing them to burst.Will J. Davis, manager of the theatre, said after the catastrophe that ifthe peopl# had remained in their seats and had not been excited by the cry of fire, not a single life would have been lost.This, however, is contradicted by the statements of the firemen, who found numbers of people sitting in their seals, their faces directed toward the stage, as if the performance was still going on. It is the opinion of the firemen that these persons had been suffocated at once by the flow of gas which came from behind the asbestos curtain.As near as can be estimated at the present time, about 1,800 people were♦Jto the theatre. Three hundred of thes? were on the first floor, the remainder being in the balconies and in the hall ways back of them.The theatre is modeled after the Opera Ceroique in PariB, and from the real* of each balcony there are three doors leading out to passageways to-trance and to atti to make its way .down the eastHt rway lead-tog Into the lobby ofcSJta oatr Out-side of the people burhed and suffocated by gas, it was to these two doorways on the first and second balconies that the greatest losy of life occurred.When the firemen entered the building the dead were found stretched in- • - i»a pile reaching from the.head of the stairway at least eight feet from the door, back to a point about five feet In the rear of the dooiS This mass of dead bodies in the center of the doorway reached to within two feet of the lop of the passageway. All of the corpses at this point were women and children.In the first and second balconiesbodies were piled up in the aisles/ • 1three and four deep, where one had j fallen and others tripped over the ; prostrate forms. All had died where IIthey lay, evidently suffocated by gaa. 1 Others were bent over backs of seats where they had been thrown by the rush of people for the doors and killed with hardly a chance to rise from their seats.One man w^s found with his back bent nearly double, his spinal column having been fractured as he was thrown backward. A woman wasMfound cut nearly in half by the back of the seat, she having been forced ov^r it face downward.In the aisles nearest the doors the scenes were harrowing in the extreme. Bodies lay in every conceivable attitude, half naked, the look on fbeir faces revealing some portion of the agony which must have preceded their death. There were scores and scores of people whose entire faces had Iimii trampled completely off by the heels of those who rushed over them, and in one aisle the body of a man was found with not a vestige of colthlng,• iflesh or bone remaining above his waistline.The entire upper portion of his body had been cut into mincemeat and carried away by the feet of those who trampled on him. A search was made carefully with the hope of finding his head, but at a late hour tonight it had not been discovered, and all that will ever tell his friends who he was I* the color and appearance of the clothing on the lower limbs, and this is in such a condition as to be hardly recognizable.About a score of people In the second balcony were saved by firemen who took them through the root and carried them down ladders in the rear of the building. Two bodies tightly locked in each other’s atms, young women aparently about 26 years ofage, were found in one end of the orchestra pit. They must bfcve fallen there from the balcony above.The body of a dark haired girl, apparently 12 years of age, was found impaled on the iron railing of the first ba’cony, she evidently having beau thrown over from the second balcony;above. • .Wtik all its clothing torn from it, but a pair of baby shoes, the body of a child about one year old .was found in a far corner of the secofod balcony, ft had evidently bee# .knocked from its mother’s arms and^^trginpled beyond recognition.ii-XI%Ts' -NO MORE WOODArchitect Who Designed Theater WillNever Use Wood in 8uchj|tructure,A Pittsburg special says,: BenjaminiII. Marshall, the Chicago architect who designed the Iroqudls theatre, left for bis home tonight, taking advantage of the first oportunity to view the scene of horror. Mr. Marshall was overwhelmed by tie news of tha disaster.*Til never Allow another theatre to be built with a stick of wood ip It/* be declared, reading bulletins which were handed to him.“The Iroquois was built along the very latest lines and was provided with twenty-seven double Are , exits, but wood was u-'ed and stairway* were employed. A fireproof building will not be erected as long a* wood U used. In theatre there are so mkny articles of iolatninable material that when a blaze once gets headway it spreads in the most alarming manner.”iIX\a8Chb*c.atlBub%nA■
Newspaper Details
Wisdom Big Hole Breezes
Wisdom, Montana, US
Fri, Jan 08, 1904
Page 2
Full Page
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Anonymous
USA 12 Jan 2023
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