Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1890-07-24
HOLOCAUST In NEW YORK
The Western Union Telegraph Build
ing Destroyed by Fire.
The Operators Behaved NObly, But
Their Efforts Were Useless,
Many Lines Of Business Were Tempo
rarily Suspended by the Fire.

New YORK, July 18.-The Western
Union Telegraph building caught fire at
! Z o clock this morning The distributing
room on the fifth foor, the operating room
on the floor above, the Associated Press
rooms and the restaurant on the seventh
floor, were completely destroyed The
! total loss will reach 800 600.
Seven persons rliracuiously escaped death.
Il few minutes before clock the opera
tors began to arrive to 60 to work About
| fifty young men and women reached the
operating room. A messenger boy saw a
puff Of smoke under d table in the dis
| tributing loom on the floor below the
operating room.
As soon as the smoke was discovered
Night Manager 1obln cried fire, and in d
moment all the men in the room Jumped
for the hand greuades which hung about
the walls. These they began to throw down
the hole where the flames were. The con-
tents splashed out when the glass broke
and the liquid sputtered little as it met
the fire That was all the
visible effect. Hand grenades could not
fight fire like this. Tobin called a mes
senger boy to go down and send in an
alarm. As soon as the boy started down
stairs the operators unrolled the big hose
wheel which is kept ready for
an emergency of this kind.
They unrolIed the hose and Tobin turned
the water in. 1t was pretty good strea N,
and it looked at first as if it would beat
the waves Of fame out of existence. But
it did not-not bit. The only effect it
seemed to have was to make the fire shoot
up higher, and it was noticed the smoke
came rolling out Of the big hole in greater
Volumes than before. The operators
worked the hose until the smoke becam
so thick that they could not see where the
fire was. Three ladies of the day force,
who had arrived. kept cool, and the OPP
orators worked like beavers. They soon
found out, however, that their efforts were
useless. The elevator man had brought
the elevator up to the fifth floor, and the
women went in the cars with some of the
men. They began to realize by this time
that the fire was going to be a more seri-
Gus affair than at first thought When
the last few men crowded into the last car
they were a little bit frightened As they
passed the floor below a hot wave rolled
over them, which made their
throats dry and parched and as the
car proceeded down, fire brands
fell upon them and burned their clothing
When the car reached the bottom they
were all glad enough to get out. Not I'M
til then did the men realize that escape
was almost cut off, and it is not on record
where men worked so hard under such fear
full circumstances and against such odds
as did these thirty men
By the fire the commercial exchanges
were completely cut off from all telegraphic
connections. TIE cotton, coffee and pro-
duce exchanges depend on the Western
Union to distribute their quotations over
the tlckers. This caused complete
suspension of the ticker service
and brought the business almost
to stand-still in exchanges. In ad-
dition all outside cities were cut off and
public grain and cotton cables were also
lost through the cutting off of wires. The
suspension Of telegraph facilities had
worse effect than the blizzard of 1888