The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1885-07-02
THE FRAME TENEMENT
COMES NEAR BEING THE SCENE OF
A FRIGHTFUL DISASTER
Several Families Narrowly Escape Death
and Three Girls Lose Their Lives In
the Flames Sad Fate of
q Sweetheart.

CLEVELAND, Ohio. July 2.-By the burn
ing of a two-story frame tenement house on
Broadway, near the Nickel Platen crossing,
early Wednesday morning, Lena Meisel,
aged 20, Sarah Rosenberg, aged 10, and
Fanny Rosenberg, aged were smothered.
The two latter were horribly burned, but
the flames apparently did not touch Miss
Meisel
The burned tenement houses were located
at $40 and 1853 Brosdwa and were owned
by Daniel Olell The lower floor of $40 was
| occupied by Max Strauss as tailor shop
| and Louis Deutsch occupied 1853 as a saloon.
| Their families occupied the rear parts of the
ground floors as living apartments. The up
per floors were occupied by three families:
| The Kaufman family, consisting of the hus-
| band, wife, and two children; the Cohen
| family, consisting Of the husband, wife and
| four children, and the Ro,enbergs, mother
| and three daughters. The families retired
as usual Tuesday night Rosie Meisel, a
niece of Mrs. Rosenberg, occupied the same
room with her two cousins. About O'Clock
a son of Cohen awoke his father and said
he smelled smoke. The father, on open
ing the door, found the hall full Of smoke,
| and quickly gave the alarm. In less
| than three minutes after Cohen was awak
| ened the house was one sheet of fire. Men,
women and children rushed through the
smoke, wringing their hands and crying foI
| help. A neighbor had in the meantime
raised ladder to the front window, down
which the kaufman family descended il
| safety. While the Kaufmans were escap
| ing, the Cohen family jumped from the win.
dows and escaped apparently without
serious injury.
Meanwhile Theodore Trau, the afiianced
of Miss Meisel who had also occupied
room in the house, rushed through the flames
and smokes earching for his sweetheart II,
called her but received no response. Ht
was about to give up the search when h,
stumbled against a crouching female
figure Lifting the girl in his arms HI
rushed to the window and Jumped
In the leap he broke his arm and received
serious internal injuries On looking int,
the face of the girl it was found that it was
not Miss Meisel, but one of the Cohen girls
At that same moment Rosie and her tw,
room-mates were struggling with death il
the room above. The noise had no
awakened the girls until it was too late {.
save them. While the other occupants wer
leaping from the windows, a cry rang GU
that there were three girls in a rear room
The firemen climbed into the windows, bu
found no trace of human beings Som
| time afterwarl a citizen named Stew
! art made a search and found tn
charred and blackened bodies o
Rosie Meisel, aged 20, and Sara
! and Jennie Rosenberg, aged 10 and s year:
! respectively. The positions of the bodie
gave evidence of a desperate struggle Mis-
Meisel was undoubtedly suffocated, as sh
was scarcely touched by the flames Tn
other two girls, however, were so terribl!
burned that it was impossible to stat
whether they were burned or smothered t
: death. Miss Meisel and Theodore Tran wer
, to have been married next Sunday.