The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1900-04-06
CONVENTION HALL BURNED.
NEE ING PLACE OF DEMOCRATIC Ma
Tl0NAl CONVENTION IN ASHES.
Other Handsome buildings Burned
Work to Begin at Once on Rebuilding
the ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Stated
and the Insurance Money Made Avail
Ready for the Convention.

City, Mo-, April 4.-Conven-
ton hall. where the democratic ma
tional convention was to have Teen
held on July 4th, was laid in ruins in
less tina thirty minutes this afternoon
by fire The structure was doomed
from the start and the firemen Early
turned their efforts TO saving adjoin-
ing property. A stiff breeze was blow
ing and before the fire was subdued
the Second Presbyterian church. ore
Of the fines edifices in the cit: the
chuch parsonage. the Lathrop public
school, a two story, Broom building.
all situated across the way on Central
street, and a half loci of three-story
fat buildings on Twelfth street, We're
totally destroyed. Several residences
were damaged and for a time it was
feared that several block of buildings
Min the residence district would go.
The aggregate loss is $500, 600, ,appor-
toned as follows: Convention hall
1926, 900, insurance 1855, GOO; church $780,
600, insured; parsonage s15.000. insur-
ed; school $500 insurance $50, 400;
Williamson block on Twelfth street
$50, 000, insurance S45. 000.
Plans are on foot to rebuild conven-
! IlOU nan lLllIilSOIdlcly III HdNt II
ready for the democratic convention
in July.
| While the fire was still in progress.
members of the Commercial Club
through whose efforts the hall was
built, mingled in the crowd of specta-
tors and began soliciting funds for a
new structure. This evening $25, 600 had
been subscribed, n Secretary Z. NJ.
| Clendenning, of the club, called a mass
,anatin1 Of niti0ano for fnnonrrny- NIGHT
to decide ways and means for raising
| an additional $50, 900. The Hall Associa-
ton has $40, 900 in the AMI, and will
ave the $3.50 o insurance for imme-
| date use, the insurance companies
having offered to waive the usual sixty
day limit and make settlement or de-
mand. The Kansas City Lumber Com
pany that furnished four-fifths of the
lumber for the old building, has agreed
| to duplicate the order at once, at the
rate in existence two years ago, and
| the Minneapolis firm that furnished the
steel Orders for the immense roof have
been asked to duplicate their order.
The fire. started just above the boil
er room where some plumbers had
been at work. There vas no fire in
the furnace and the suppositiOn is
that the blaze started from a spirit
lamp or by the crossing of an cleo
trio light wire. A still alarm was first
turned in and by the time the first ell
CINE arrived, ten minutes later, the
whole building was a mass of flames,
and in less than half an hour the roof,
upheld by massive steel gfrders that
| spawned it's 200 feet of breadth fell
with a crash that sent shower OF
| burning embers in every direction.
A strong wine carried the flames tC
the Second Presbyterian church. on
the opposite side of Thirteenth and
Central streets, and in forty minutes
that structure, occupying a half block.
in length, was in ruins. The parSon-
| age adjoining and next to the Lathrop
school, which was partially destroyed
in the cyclone of 1883, and which had
been set aside for the use of the news
paper correspondents during the COM
ing convention, were attacked stimuli
t~aneously and soon nothing but their
walls were left standing. Fortunately,
the school children had not returne
to their rooms after the noon hour and
all were gotten to places of safety.
| Next the flames caught the Williamson
brick flats, across the alley from the
hall on the north on Twelfth street, and
these were Quilted. The fats occupied
a half block, and We're three stories in
height.
Convention hall has been claSSed as
one of the largest n most perfectly
constructed auditoriums in the world
The building was erected in 1898 at a
cost CT $235, 600, which was raised en-
tirely by public subscription 1t &C.
| cupied a piece Of ground 314 by zoe
| feet in extent, was two stories high
| and built of native stone, IT cream
brick and terra Gotta.