Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1883-04-05
Stones for Bread.

After much travail the legislature has
brought forth bill for the protection of
human life. by providing means of es-
cape from hotels, apartment houses and
other buildings in case of fire. 1t is
simply revised edition of the old story
OF the mountain and the mouse. In
the chaotic picture of standpipes. chem
ical extinguishers, metallic ladders,
water barrels, red lights and magnetic
alarms, there is not to be found one
ray of actual protection. Hotels
may be built as flimsily as ever, and if
so wished, carried up ten and twelve
stories. They may be fire-traps of the
most dangerous description. provided
they furnish the equipment called
for in this bill. Then they may burn
down as speedily as they please, and
startle the world with another horrible
holocaust.
The bill, which is the best that could
be produced after long session, shows
tnc ulteI loOllShheSS, III no WORST, Oh at
tempting TO meet the evil brought so
glaringly into prominence by the flames
of the Newhall House pyre by any such
halfway measures.
There is but one way of providing alb
solute safety for the inmates of hotels,
apartment houses and factories. and
that Is law compelling the
erection of tire-proof buildings when
ever they are carried above two stories
in height. Perfect security can be Sc
cured in no other way, and anything
short of this is a mockery and delu-
sion. The present bill, and others of its
class, is purely an ingenious method of
lodging the main question, and the only
one upon which the legislature was
called to decide, of how to secure the
safety of those who were forced for
longer or shorter period to become res
idents of the hotels in this State
The people asked for protection,
and the legislature give them
fre-escape They asked for as
surance that when they went to sleep at
night they would not be awakened by the
grim, curdling cry of fire, resounding
through the corridors, and tie legisla-
turc give them stand pipe and chem
ical eXtinguisher. The fact is so note
rious as TO be commonplace, that people
awakened suddenly by burst of flame,
or aroused by the suflocation produced
by sitting smoke are not often in con-
dition to use a fire escape even if the
same is right at hand. 1t takes cool
head and steady nerve to swing loose
from the fifth story of a burning hotel,
with nothing but fral iron ladder be-
tween the victim and terra firma. Very
few men are able to do this, how much
less will it be of use in assisting the es-
cape of women and children Speaking
on this subject, Harper's Weekly, of re-
cent date, says:
Fire-escapes in buildings, as the words
are commonly understood, are not
enough. A narrow ladder offering the
only means of escape from crowded
factory, for instance. would be choked
by panic-stricken throng of human be-
ings. The proper use of an iron ladder
or two on the outside of lofty buildings
requires a GOODNESS and care and pa
thence and intelligence which cannot be
assumed to exist under the circum-
stances. All buildings which are de-
signed to hold great numbers of per-
sons--hotels, factories, apartment
houses OF every kind should be required
by law to be practically fre-proof. 1t
is not the fire-escape, but the fire-proof
building, that is wanted.
This feeling is growing daily through
out the country, and ere long public
sentiment will secure the result which
Legislators now deny. How much bet
ter would it have been if the present
legislature had caught the whispered
sound and wisely took the lead in this
work of reform.