Watertown leader. [volume] (Watertown, Jefferson County, Wis.) 1909-1911, 1911-03-31
FOCUS ENERGIES
TOF|X FIRE BLAME
Authorities Find Appalling Condi-
ditions in Disaster Probe.
DEATH LIST Is NOW 142
Relief Fund Headed by Andrew Car
negie Is Started - Thirty-Three
Bodies nidentified-Some
Of Injured May Die.

New York.-Borough President
McAneny OF Manhattan, the dis
trict attorneys staff, the fire mar
shall, the coroner and the state labor
department are bending every energy
toward fixing the blame for the loss
Of 142 lives in the shirtwaist factory
fire in Washington square.
Dozens of Investigators collected
every scrap of available information.
Grand jury men turned personal prob
ers, and an additional grand jury in
formal resolution presented to the
court of general sessions, offered their
aid to the district attorney and de-
clared that some one should be prose
cuted for the disaster.
What the probers found-evidence
that doors at exits swung inward, the
crumpled fire escape in the airshaft,
the one fire escape blocked by iron
shutters when opened, an empty wa
ter tank on the roof and the practice
prevalent among cutters of lighting
cigarettes a few minutes before quit
ting time-all this, and what is yet to
be ferreted out, will be placed speed
lily before the grand jury for action,
District Attorney Whitman announced
The tenement house department
summoned owners Of half a dozen
faulty structures to police court as
preliminary step to a far-reaching in
Vestigaion of tenements. One man
was held for violating the law, and
other cases, 1t was announced, will be
pressed. Fire Marshal Beers sum-
moned the proprietors of the Triangle
Waist company and several employees
to testify at a public investigation,
largely to inquire into the truth Of re-
ports that doors leading to fire exits
were blocked
so far as | can discover" he said,
there has never been a fire drill in
this factory. In my opinion, it would
take 1000 girls three hours to reach
the street by the one fire escape In
that building. Nine-tenths of the en-
ployes cannot speak English, yet |
could not find a sign in Yiddish or
Italian pointing out the fire exits
A relief fund for the sufferers is
headed by a $4,000 donation from An
drew Carnegie. The United Hebrew
Charities, the Austrian Hebrew Free
Burial association and other organiza-
lions came to the fore with aid.
Thirty-three bodies, most of them
shorn of all semblance to human form,
lie unidentified at the Charities Pier
morgue. Twelve persons, most of
them girls in their teens, are fighting
for life in hospitals. Half a hundred
funeral trains trailed through the East
Side and the Italian district near the
factory. The unidentified will be
buried in single grave, but will be
held as long as possible to give rela-
tives and friends an opportunity to
claim them.
Final figures place the death list at
142. Of these 1873 bodies were taken
from the scene Of the disaster and
nine died in hospitals. The list will
be swelled, surgeons say, by others
who, still living, have no chance to
recover.
With the tragic scenes of Saturday
nights fire fresh in their minds, 125
girls employed by the clothing firm
OF Manson & Jacobson in History
loft building at 80 to SO West Eigh-
teenth street were thrown into
panic by the cry of fire and many in
! jured in the wild rush, which soon
| extended to employees on two other
| floors of the building.
Before the alarm of fire was found
| to be false one two girls had been
severely tramped by the fleeing
| crowds. Scores of other girls were
bruised and cut by broken glass and
their clothing torn in the rush.