Audubon County journal. (Exira, Iowa) 1884-1993, 1901-06-27
FATAL FIREWORKS.
SEVENTEEN PERSONS PERISH IN
BLAZING TENEMENT HOUSE.
Building Is Blown Up and Fire Follows
ExpIosion-WaI!s Fall on Eiremen
Fighting ReIow-Proprietor to Be
Held Under Arrest.

Held Under Arrest.
New York, June 22.-Seventeen per
sons are believed to have been killed
and number injured yesterday as the
result OF fire following an explosion
among quantity of fireworks in the
store of Abraham NJ Rittenberg, at
Paterson, N. ]. The fire was on the
ground floor of tenement building
Inc cause OF the explosion is not
known and the property loss will not
exceed. $4,000. Twelve bodies have
been recovered.
The dead are: Mrs. Lucinda Adam.
son, Mrs. Charles Williams. Charles
Williams, Harold Rittenberg, Henry
Elsasser, Mrs. Bert Bamberg and
Mrs. Mary Elsasser, Mrs. Burns and
child, Mrs Andrew Elvin and babe,
Mrs. Mary Elssaser, Mrs. Burns and
son. Mrs. Ann Fentemann, Mrs. Annie
Lannigan and two nephews.
The injured: Mr.. and Mrs. }. Jessut
and Mr.. and Mrs John McGlone,
burned about faces and bodies; Fire
man Lingland, injured by falling wall;
George Soder, head severely cut.
The building in which the explosion
occurred was frame tenement four
stories high, with stores on the ground
floor. The middle store was occupied
by Rittenberg. Ten families occupied
flats in the building. So great was
the force of the explosion that a boy
playing in the street half a block away
was lifted from his feet and hurled
against an iron fence. One of his legs
was broken. A trolley car was direct.
ly in front of the building when the
explosion occurred. The burst of
flame blown out into the street
scorched the side of the car and singed
the hair of the passengers. A number
of those on the upper floors when the
explosion took place were either
stunned and burned to death, or found
escape cut off and We're suffocated.
After the first explosion there was a
succession of smaller ones and then
came second big explosion, which
was muftied and deadened and probably
occurred in the cellar.
A1NSiS WinuoW SSSluSu 10 U6 emitting
flame after the first explosion. A WON.
an, her clothing on fire, leaped out of
one of the windows and fell to the
yard below. Her body was dragged
out of reach of the flames, but the flesh
was roasted and dropped from the
bones. She proved to be Mrs. Will
Jams. Mrs. Williams husband was a
cripple. He was found burned to a
crisp on his bed.
Some of the occupants of the rooms
dropped from the windows and were
bruised, Others hung from the win
dows until the firemen came and 20
persons were taken down in this way
through the fire and smoke by the fire
men, while others dropped into life
nets. The firemen had hardly taken
their positions and begun to throw
water into the upper floors when
without warning the whole upper part
OF the building above them sagged out.
ward and fell. The captain and two of
his men We're buried under the blaz-
ing debris. One of the men is badly
hurt. The building in which the ex-
plosion occurred was destroyed. Rit-
tenberg will probably be arrested
pending an Investigation
The bodies taken out thus far are al
most unrecognizable and are burned
and torn by the fire and the collapse Of
the timbers of the building.