The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1907-07-29

driven southeast by that lucky wind. and
we're eating their way at a terrilcally fast
pace toward the ocean walks. the bath
houses and the big dark buildings where
Fred Henderson and Louis Stauch feed the
hungry f%uDhunters.
A PAST. RBc FIRE.
There is never anything slow abou a
Coney Island fire. They never travel
gradually or take a decent, l~eisurely time
about their business. they 20 On the
Jump. throwing ahead sparks which quickly
become raging fires. That's the' way II
vas yesterday morning a big chunk 81
blazing wood OF canyas blown ahead OF
the wind and dropping on a thin painted
chicken coop Of a building. and then II
sharp, fierce burst OF fame straight up in
the air with a tower Of black smoke rolling
beyond il.
One man, a mOrtuarian of Gravesend.
awakened by a friendly cop and advised to
hurry to the show. observed as he held his
tapping pajamas hat the blaze moved by
quick, darling flashes. He noticed here
and there n tiny wriggling blaze getting
hold OF the indammable lath and burlap
OF which Coney is made; then all at once a
great leap of flame shooting thirty feet
into the air at a jump. and then the rapid
collapse Of the fiimsy framework on which
tho fire had fed. Old Frank Franklin.
Circus Frank, who has been through
several Coney Island fires in his time. sized
It up by saying that "she travelled like the
devil was a hurryin' to chase her back to
hell. and that's a fact, young man"
These things explain vaguely what a
desperate fight Deputy Chief Lally had on
his hands when he mad a downright
Vanderbilt cup race Of IL, dashing from Fire
Headquarters in Brooklyn to Surf avenue,
q little more than ten miles, in q shade less
than sixteen minutes, which 10 going some
even for a fire chief in a hurry.
But minutes before Hurry Up Lally was
offttie Job and all the fire engines that Brook
fyn could spare were changing and smoking
and splitting fire in the narrow spaces OF
Cuney there were things doing from Steeple-
chase to Dreamland and from Surf avenue
TO the beach. The blowing Of police
whiatles, the yells Of strong lunged cops all
sloaR the dark ways, the hammering Of the
big IRE bell in Luna Park, the smashing Of
windows by BRICKS and stones and the
great roar Of voices that started up all at
Oncs, II deemed, and really never died down
for two stresvous hours, woke up Coney in
just about As much time as il takes to
describe It.
scxNEs tx THE o Il
In halt an hour that section OF the island
where the flames we're jumping wal slam
bang crazy with fright for the time being.
Men who laughed about it sfterward did
harum-scarum foolish things, clear out
- tha,- haaIa f1r Tho ant liba wraN-
ping a pet monkey up in a coverlet and
carrying it to the police station, thinking
il was n baby; turning the hose on a piano
which stood safely enough 200 yards from
the fire lines or demanding Of a p~rofane
and frightened poll parrot whati it had done
with a pocketbook.
Every narrow little street and alleyway in
the path Of the rushing flames was clogged
by men and women who laughed and
cursed and cried and screamed out of sheer
excitement as they labored desperately TO
get their poor belongings carted or carried
out of danger. The firemen and police,
with little time to waste stumbling over
trucks and wheelbarrows and carts, had
to oct roughly sometimes rs the only way
to quiet such hysteria, They didn't use
their clubs, but there was many a cuff
handed out by a big open hand which will
never be reported. TO Bingham, O'Keeffe
or Hanson.
Along Seaside walk, Kensington walk
aud TiIyou.s walk, three little alleyways
that run from Surf avenue straight to
the ocean front, there were a number of
rickety little nighthawk hotels with music
hall attachments and barrooms on the
ground floor, like the Bohemia Cafe, Ken
nedv'S Cafe, the Roseben Hotel manned
after .Davy Johnson's great six furlong
sprinterl. Hoch's Arcade and Hotel. No.
JAMS music hall and bath house, the Oriole !
Hotel. kept by Arenau Bros; the Sparta
Hotel, Wack's Pavilion and Cafe, and any
number Of tinv booths where the brass
finged palm readers and professors of
mystery and the occult hung out and raked
in easy money,
Ont offthese poured az the worst of the
scare. their women inmates. some of them
il may be truthfully reported clothed |
in little else than a nightgown and hope. |
They ran out screaming that they were
already burned, and clutching in their |
hands or dragging after them some piece
OF property they wanted most to save.
One woman Lizzie something or other
broke out Of Hoch's Arcade, her hair stream |
ing down her back, carrying an infant
down over her right shoulder and
gripping the baby by it's ankle. She didn't
what she was doing until a fireman
grabbed her. .rigbted the child and got !
her out Of the jam.
= THE HOMELESS CARED FOR.
1t was bitter hard luck for some of the |
women the rouged and powdered women ]
who made their living On the stages of the !
beery, smoky music halls and who were
thrown out into the crowd without a stitch
10 their backs EXCEPT the thin night gar
mepts they had on. What little money they |
had saved and their few tawdry belongings
we're burned, the fire moved too fast to
think of saving many things and they were
left 70 stand out Of the crush, to weep and
10 swear.
i. These and many more were taken care Of
in the best way circumstances allowed by
the open hearted Coneyites who had had
bed and board out of the burned territory.
COney will sting a range for whst easy
money he may have about him. but when
n comes to taking care OF her own in a case
II hard hack she doesn't stop to ask for
references or certificates of character.
With the tangle OF trucks and carts
even children's toy wagons were used
the police and 'firemen had most trouble.
big saloon keeper in Seaside Walk,
when the fire was almost on aim, backed a