The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1911-03-27
Horrible Scenes Result From
the Awful Fire Of Last
Saturday Evening
INVESTIGATION Of ChUsESTARTED
BY 1HED|STR|CT ATTORNEY
Cigarette Thrown Into Scrap Heap
Under the Cntting Table May Have
Started the Awful Condsgration-
Gruesome Evidence Of Identification

NoW 4OrAs MATCH Il-Elgnty.S1x
bodies Of the 141 victims Of the fire
In the ten story building ON Wasb,v-
ton Place, Saturday night have o
identified. Sixteen Of the bodies W.
men,. There were twelve injured III
the hospitals.
District Attorney Whitman started
an official investigation today to fix
the responsibility for the horror. No
arrests have been made by. the dis
trtct attorney Of any person in con-
nection with the fire, and none will
be made until the facts disclosed in
the investigation gives sufficient war
rant for taking this action. Fire
Marshal Beers began his Official in
vestigatton today. It is now definitely
known that the fire started on the
eighth 1oor. The fire began under
the cutting table In a scrap heap pre-
sumably from cigarette.
District Attorney Whitman said to-
day that according to sections 80 and
81 OF the state labor laws, the re-
sponsibility for the disaster lies en-
tirely with the state department Of
labor. The building was inspected by
the department month ago. Mr..
Whitman has sent to Albany for q
copy of. the report made then.
Crowds assembled today at the
morgue to view the bodies. At least
half OF the. corpses were unrecog-
nizable and only small trinkets or q
shred Of clothing will. help to show
who the unfortunate was. Some of
the bodies will. never be. claimed. The
managers Of the Triangle Waist COM
pany which occupied the burning
floors denied today thst tho Iron doors
leading to the elevator ana stairs were
locked s. ........ ......... -
y " E
Progress. has been made by the
public and civil organizations toward
Offering relief to those who have suf-
fered as the result Of the fire.. Mayor
Gaynor headed the list with 500 and
made an appeal to the citizens Of the
city for relief fund.
Fire Marshal Beers summoned the
proprietors Of the. Triangle Waist
company and several employees Of the
firm to testify at the public investi-
cation. He will inquire particularly
into the statements that the doors
leading to the exits were locked. $50
far as l have been able to discover" /"
said Mr.. Beers, there has never been
fire drill in this factory. In my
opinion it would take 700 girls three
hours to reach the street by the fire
escape that was used in the building.
can say that the shutters obstructed
this IRE escape.
Horrible Scenes ct Pier.
Two hundred thousand persons, the
police estimate, filed in q serpentine
line to the pier from the opening Of
the improvised morgue at / o'clock
Sunday morning until late last night.
At times the line extended beyond
Twenty-third street, four blocks away
and tens Of thousands, impelled by
morbid curiosity were turned away
by the police.
Nearly a hundred collins lay in q
long row upon the pier. awaiting re-
moval or Identification Of the charred
bodies they contained. Forty human
forms, 60 burned, blackened and dis
torted that they will never be recog-
nized, lay covered by white canvass
in plain pine collins apart from those
less horribly mangled. Unless they
are identified by the trinkets and
jewelry found on their blackened
limbs. they will I'LL a single grave Of
unknown dead.
A signet ring, found ,clinging to a
shred Of flesh on q little girls finger,
made Identification possible where all
other means would have failed. A man
who had stood in line six hours wan
dered aimlessly among the bodies
seeking his missing daughter until
with a groan he identified heap Of
charred clothing as her garments.
He collapsed and sought to kill him
self but the police prevented him and
he continued the search for his wife,
also missing.
A pale girl bent over misshapen
mass long and doubtingly. Then, with
Q final effort, she grasped q hand
which protruded from beneath the
canvass and. with . shrek. collapsed.
The blackened mass, she sobbed, had
been her sweetheart. to whom she had
become engaged the night before the
disaster. A ring on his finger told
her Of his identity. She asked if the
dead man had had Q watch. They
brought It to her; she opened II and
gazed at her own features.
Twenty sicilian women became hys-
terical at once upon recognizing their
kin in the pine cohins. A man whose
Acs was marked by scar Of flame.