The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1888-08-10
A FIRE TRAP.


IL Causes the Death of Seventeen Per-
sons and the Injuring of Eleven Others
in New York City - Heart-Rending
Scenes at the Burning of Six-Story
Tenement.
NEW YORK, Aug. 4-Seventeen people
were burned to death In a six story brick
building in the rear of 1877 Bowery Friday
afternoon. Six more, burned so badly
that they will probably die, were
removed to various hospitals. The
house was ramshackle affair, hid
den in the middle of the block, the only
entrance to it being a narrow alley
way from the Bowery. In front of it was
four story building on the first floor of
which was a saloon called the White
House. Adjoining this is Harry Miners
Peoples Theater. In the rear of the
burned building were two houses hem
ming it in on the Christie street
side. In this caged-in building lived
about $50 people. Each of the six
floors was occupied by a single family,
the head of which was tailor who made
clothing for the cheap wholesale clothing
houses, and employed from fifteen to TWEEN
ty men, wemen and children, in addition
to his own family, in making up the
clothing. They were all Polish Jews,
and employers and employed worked,
ate and slept in the crowded rooms
of the dingy tenement. The tenants
who rented the apartments were s. Coon,
S. Graft, Klein & Marks, s. Harris and 81.
Levina. About Ais o'clock p m, while
all the occupants of the building were
busily at work i'll the closing hours pre-
ceding their Sabbath eve, flames broke out
on the lower floor. The fire had, when dis
covered, already gained such Roadway that
it was in full possession of the stairway,
and escape by it seemed impossible.
A stout German woman rushed frantic
ally into the street wringing her hands and
screaming out: Mein Gottl Mein Gottl
Dose peoples are burning up!' This was a
startling reminder that lives were in peril,
and great excitement ensued. The police
reserve was called out, and in short order
100 blue-coats in charge of Inspector
Williams were on hand ready to assist the
fremen. Alarm after alarm was sent out
after ambulances, and in very little
while surgeons rolled up from st. Vincent,
Chambers street, Bellevue and New York
hospitals, while the department of chart
ties and corrections sent two of their am
balances. Their services were badly
headed. Many of the frightened inmates
rushed down through the flames and es-
capped to the narrow courtyard with
clothes ablaze and hands and bodies burned
Six OF them were so severely burned that
that they were taken to the hospital, and
may die. There were fire. escapes on the
front and rear of the house perpendicular
iron ladders running down the front and
rear OF the bu lding), but before any Of the
INN tnC bod f1,s.1 -
flames had assembled through the house
and were reaching from the windows, so
that descent by the fre-escapes was i'm
possible.
One man, already half burned to DEATH
leaped from fifth-story window and fell a
mangled mass of flesh in the little court
yard. Others jumped from the second.
story windows and escaped with bruises
The enormous crowds that had gathered
shrank with fearsome dread and sym
pathy as the wounded shrieked and
groaned with the pain.
Charles W. Norman, property man of the
Peoples Theater, with several of his COM
rades, ran to the roof of the theater carry
ing small ladder, which they stretched
over to window of the burning building
A woman with her hair and clothing al.
ready ablaze appeared at the window, and
Norman called to her to cross over on the
ladder. She cried back that she could not
leave her two children. Norman tried to
cross over on the ladder, but the flames
drove him back and he could not save her
Afterward the charred bodies of the moth
er and two children were found in the
building Three men, however, availed
themselves of the ladder and escaped to
the roof of the theater.
When the fremen had at last drowned
the flames So that they could enter the
house, they searched floor by floor as they
assembled, and on the third floor Ghey
found the burned bodies of man, a
woman and boy. On the fourth floor
they found five bodies so badly burned
that it was impossible to tell whether they
were those of men or women. On the fifth
floor no bodies were found, but on the sixth
five more bodies were found, and they
also were burned so that it could not be
told whether they were the bodies of men
or women.
While the firemen were searching the
ruins the cry came that the roof was fall
ing in and the cracking of timbers was
heard. The fremen did not desert the
building, but ran to the windows where
they waited orders. They shouted to
Chief McGill, who was on the roof
he shouted back. He climbed a lad
but he shouted back orders to prop
it up, and this was successfully DONE ALI
the bodies had not been taken down, and
until this was done the firemen would not
desert the ruins
CouoraI of bo I,od;oc 1r,a,.a I,,,r,oJ .o
badly that they fell apart when they were
removed, and the firemen were obliged to
lower them from the windows in nets
The names of the dead are:
Adele Gruft, aged %, with her newborn
babe, burned to death; Joseph Gruft years,
burned to death; Celia Gruft, years, burned
to death; Philip Taloph, % years, killed by
jumping from sixth story; Henry Schwartz,
tailor suffocated on fourth floor; woman I'M
known, at morgue, burned beyond recognition;
Abraham Schneider, SO years, burned to death;
Solomon Weinberg, burned almost beyond
recognition ten men at morgue burned be-
You'd recognition. The death of Asias Spen-
net at the hospital at late hour makes the
seventeenth death to midnight
The injured number eleven.
The fire started on the first floor in the
apartment of Emma Stevenson, the jan
itress Of the building, and was caused by
the explosion of kerosene-oil stove.
The burned building belonged to
Lawyer Abraham Stern, who bought
it six months ago. The damage to
the building is about $1,000, covered by in
surance. The loss on the stock of cloth
ing in the various apartments is estimated
at SIS, 600. 1t is believed it was not insured.
The house in the rear of the death-trap
was badly burned, and the Peoples Thea
ter was slightly damaged by fire and
water.
GREAT STRIKE AT DULUTH.
Laborers to the Number of 1000 Quit
Work--A Disturbance Caused.
DULUTH, Mimi, Aug. About 1000 la
borers employed on the streets and on
rock work here struck for an increase
in wages from $1.50 to 50 day.