The daily palladium. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1904-1905, 1904-03-03

could not put one fair sized Baltimore
fire out. The methods of the New
Workers are SO different from those of
our own men that it is impossible to
compare them except to say that the
New York fireman looks out for good
place where he can stand and shoot his
hose at the fire. The Baltimore fire
man goes right in after it. Our men
push their way into buildings in order
to throw their energies where they will
do most good. The New Yorker is all
right, but his idea seems to me to be
that of long range artillery.
In regard to the reports that no
lives have been lost, I desire to say
that while we all wish that it might
be true no reasonable man can believe
it. How does any one know that no
one has been killed by these falling
walls or suffocated in the acres of
burning territory in which men were
struggling for dear life in the last few
minutes? Our firemen have taken
enormous risks. Private citizens. try
ing to save property, have gone to
great lengths, and not until the ruins
are cleared Will it be known how many
lives have been lost. A fire is a very
seductive foe. In the lumber yard dis
tricts one might often notice that those
who were permitted to go behind the
lines would be lured by their own in
tereSt in a peculiar point of attack into
remaining much longer than was safe
Suddenly somebody would call atten-
ton to the approach of flames from an
other direction, and the way the group
that had collected would run for their
lives was striking sight. 1t does not
stand to reason that in all of these
brushes the fire has been deprived OF
its prey. l expect to see quite a death
roll when the results of this disaster
have been tabulated.
Il have a terrible walk before me to
get home tonight, since the cars have
stopped running, such as l would have
in few other cities. Baltimore has
grown so rapidly and it's suburban
communities extend so far that the
prostration of its electric car lines
works peculiar havoc. l have wished
many times that this were a smaller
city. where l could live nearer my
work. But l suppose 1 must accept
this as one of the penalties entailed by
Baltimore's growth. In Chicago | I'M
derstand that much of the pavement
was of wood and so burned up too. You
will notice that our pavement has been
undiSturbed by even calamity of this
magnitude, and the showers of brick
and stone that have fallen upon it will
leave it no more irregular than it was
yesterday. l tell you, Baltimore is
great city and never showed it more
than today"
An experienced fire fighter who saw
the Chicago disaster in 1871 relates
that certain phenomena then observed,
but of the rarest occurrence. could be
plainly noticed on the night of the
fire. He says: ga building would be
aglow at the corner of block, but the
rest of the line perfectly dark and APP
parently safe for the time being. Sud
denly a building half n block away
would be seen all aglow inside, and
almost with the promptness with
which electric lights may be turned
on in the different parts of q theater
the buildings one after another would
blossom forth into this brilliant glow
and would soon be in flames. The heat
was so intense that everything leaped
into flame in the entire region affected.
This is the trouble with big fires
their cumulative force is not offset by
any corresponding increase in the eff
cheney of fire fighting apparatus. Twen-
ty engines will throw only twice the
water of ten. Twenty buildings in
flame, on the other hand, will produce
conditions four times as favorable for
the spread of combustion as ten build
ings and perhaps forty times as ia
vorable. Certain it is that a great fire
outruns the fighting apparatus of the
world, and it is only by checking
fire in it's beginnings that the worst re-
suits can be avoided"