Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1893-06-16

! Washington, June 9.-HundGedS OF
men We're carried down today by the
falling walls of building which was
VIGOROUSLY insecure. Human lives were
crushed out by tons OF bricks and iron
and sent unhOusaled to the throne of
! their maker. Men by the score were
MANNED and distigured for life. Happy
families were hurled into the depths of
despair; women calling for their huS
bands; children calling for their fathers;
mothers calling for their sons, and not
! an answer to their cries; this is but a
shadow of the awful calamity that be-
fell this city this morning.
J Words cannot picture the aWfulnesS
! Of the accident. imagination stands
back and fails to give any idea OF the
| scene. Its horrors will never be fully
told. Its suddenness was almost the
chief horror. In a moment, in u twink
ling OF an eye, was the change, and
men who came TO the scene of their
/ daily toll will never return alive.
In the national capital of the proudest
nation of the earth there, has been a
catastrophe unparalleled ia the annals
of history, and in every mind there is
a horrible convictions that its genesis is
to be found in criminal negligence of a
government too parSlmOniOuS to provide
safety to its loyal servants by erecting
buildings proper for their accon3moda-
! ton.
! 1t was between $50 and 10 O'Clock
this morning that the floors Of the old
tords theater building, Tenth street,
occupied by the records, of the pension
division Of the surgeon-generaIs office,
fell in as though they had been the
cards OF 4 card house.
! On each floor We're scores Of men at
work. Without warning they were
carried down as by an awful cataract.
The flood was made up Of iron Orders,
hardly strong enough to support the
walls but heavy enough. to. stamp out
Human lives; of bricks held together
by plaster long since dried OUT wooden
beams that had been in place too long.
There was no escape from such flood.
| The government of a great nation
could not afford to provide a safe build
ing for it's faithful employees, but herd
) ed them together in building whose
unsOund condition was notorious. Again
and again have the columns Of the
press been filed with the story of rot
ten walls. There is shame and remorse
on the souls of some men who were
responsible for the state of things that
confined. the men working for their
daily bread in a building that every
enc III the city of Washington knew
was unsafe.
| IWenty-eight years ago there was an
other tragedy within the walls of this
building The news of it was flashed
to the four quarters of the earth and
! it brought CONSERVATION wherever it
went. The man who was killed was
the president of the United States. As
! though the building had borne a curse
upon it from that time it ended it's
career. in a fitting manner. But how
much better it would have been if the
| government had removed the structure
years ago.
/ Those in the multitude who could
think of something beside the catas-
trOphe alone remarked upon the strange
| SOAAS1dthCc tldL LlE DuI1luS3 LA WHICH,
John Wilkes Booth slew President Lin
coin should fall and kill scores of peo7.
pie on the very day that the body Of
the assaSsin's brother was being laid
at it's final rest.
j The edidence found in official rec
ordS appears conclusive that as long
ago as 1885 this building, which the
/ government purchased after the aSSaS-
slnation and used as an army museum,
was officially proclaimed by congress
an unsafe depository for even animate
sections, mummies and the books Of an
army medical museum for which a SAT
er place of storage was provided by an
act of congress; but Notwithstanding the
fact that in the public press and in
congress also continuous attention was
called to the bulging walls OF the build
ing and it's darkness and general un-
suitability and unsafety, it continued to
be use for the daily employment of
nearly 500 government clerks of the
pension record division of the war Of
fee.
The building collapsed in the midst
of an nl-judged effort to remedy some of
its defects. The moral of the disaster
is emphasized by the fact that there are
known to be at least two great govern
ment buildings, the printing office, and
the annex of the war department, each
containing many more employees than
were engaged in the FOrd's theater
death trap which are in an equally dan
gerous condition.
!, While the work of rescuing was going
on men who had been strangers to
emotion wept like children and turned
away their faces as the limp and life
less bodies Of those who had been