Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1900-11-07
BURIED In THE RUINS
Fire And Exploding Chemicra
Cause Great LOSS OF Life
SEVEN STORY BUILDING WRECKED
The Fire Originated In q Drug Store--Ex
ploding Chemicals Destroyed The
Building--Many Pc, sons
Perished In the
Ruins.


ing OF Tarrant d Co., makers of medi-
cinail speciahfuies, standing alt the
northwest ccrner of Greenwich and
Warren streets, tand filed with che1ni.
c1als, took fire in some way that may
never be known alt about IL: Is O'Clock
this arternoon. 1t was just ait this
time THAT a citizen rushed into the
house of fire engine 30, on Chambers
street, near Greenwich, AMID shouted
that Tarrant's drug store was on fire.
He had seen a volume OF black smoke
coming from the third story window.
An Nbar1n wlas turned in. Soon after
wairA1 SECOND and third ALARMS were
turned in. One fire company had just
arrived, when a ternfic explosion oc-
CURED and threw the entire engine
crew down the stairway. The fire
men, rea;i1ing the danger OF thear
position, rushed out of the building to
the street. The explosion had filed
the streets in front with showers OF
falMing glass and debris, which sent
tine crowd which wats already gather
ed on the opposite sidewalks fleeing
Dor safety alnd caused the horses
hitched ITO the engines TO rear and try
TO get away.
Engineer Rocksberry waH unfasten-
ing the horses and Fireman Brown
was turning the safety valve of the
engine when 1.-THE explosion occurred
Alnd covered them with shower OF
| glass Both were injured, as was am
other fireman belonging to the COM
psany.
Captain Devanney of the company
ordered his crew back into the build.
| ing agtadn. The were dragging the
Ene to the doorway for the second
time when came amDther explosion,
more terrific fhan the fiN1St, and the
| whole crew were hurled across Green
witch street. Devanney being so bad-
| ly 6njured that he was sent to a hospa-
usX.
I'm the meaStime the other engines
that had responded 20 the alarm had
collected and the fremen we're busy
rescuing people from surrounding
buildings. Filremen had already taken
many girls down the only five escape
from tme building and more persons
had been CARRIED down the escapes OF
the Home Made restaurant. next door,
| and isspr,els. from which the fumes
| rem street.
/
five mi1aItes after the first. FROM the
a,ccounhs of witnesses the building
seemed ITO leap into the air and in a
moment masses of brick wald, timbers
and stone were fa,lling into the street.
The force of the explosion tore away J
the wa,Ils of the big commission store
houses fronting on Washington stree'
snd caused them to collapse, falling
all at once in "a mass of timber, boxes
and barreTs. from which the fiamis
burst out from the Tarrant BUILDING
like the bebching OF "a cannon at once
broke forth. :.
Across Warren street to the Opposite
buildings the flames Qtaped, settlng
hem all on fire IA. once, the force Oh
Ihe explosion demo,isldng windows
und aid dpuden STRUCTURES about the
houses. In "a moment Warren street
WAS checked with "a mass OF DEBRIS
lnrl lthe whole place was afiame. The
treah explosion wtas followed by hall
dbzen more scarcely besss intense anu
by "a countless number of smaller
snes.
By this time the five apparaItus was
lrriving from every direction. deputy
Chief Ahe.arn came about two minutes
after the second series of eXpiOsl00s
nut he lalt once ordered a fifth alarm
sent out, Followed by general car
Ddr ambulamces. The expulsion ano
FIRE together had now assumed the
proportion of a great catastropns
and st was Thought that hundreds ol
lives had been lost Throngs of peo-
ple were rushing about in the nearby
bureefts, many of them panic stracken
fleeing fnom the fire. They mingled
lin the crowd that was rushing down
from Broadway to see what had hap
Ipened.
In addition to the great number OF
Injured who were 'talOen from Int
ruins ait the scene of the disaster ol
from the immediate vicinity and car
rted lin ambulances to the various hos
pitals, "a great number of cases, some
of them said ITO be more than tr1tilng
were a,utended to in the down fowl
districts.
The heads OF the city department.
concerned in the many-sided disaster
hurried to the scene of the fire. Chie1
IDevery of the police department, witt
Deputy Chief Mclaughlin and Ihspec
tor Brooks amid Captain McCnskey o
but a few minutes after Fire Chic
Croker. Commissioner ScanneM OF th'
Ere department, Deputy Commissioner
Brennan of the chaln1ties department
In which the city's hospitals are In
studded and Superintendent Dooner O.
the buildings department were sooa OF
the scene
Half an hour after the explosion tn
istreets for blocks around the fire wer
crowded. with fire apparatus, with Z
scroe OF ambulaDoes, while hundred'
OF police were being rushed from al
the lower precincts of the city to form
lines, and many priests from nearb.
.arishes were going here and there il
lthe sr.oKsGoDscureu thorough n's -
seeking the injured who might nee
I | their aid. From the burning distrfca
: a column of smoke was rising high 1
: | the sa6r. mingled with flames tha
: couH c-5t be controlled by hundred
: os streams thrown upon them.
!, The secenx1 explosion carried dc
: | structSon in every direction. That
Z did not cause a wholesale boss OF M
!; | was due to the fact that almost te
minutes warming came after the nm
5 cry of fre-a cry that was a rez
! warning no people who knew the chzl
hiuter of the chemicals in the burnin