The herald-advance. (Milbank, S.D.) 1890-1922, 1911-03-31

and fifty-One perSOnS-nine-tenths or
them girls from the East side-were
crushed to death on the pavements,
s%mothered in smoke, or shriveled crisp
in a factory fire and twelve are dying
in hospitals in the worst disaster New
York has known since the steamship
Gen. Slocum was burned to h waters
edge off North Brothers island In 1904.
Nearly all, if not all, of the victims
were employed by the Triangle Waist
company on the eighth, ninth and tenth
floors of a 10-story loft building. on the
western fringe of the downtown whole
sale clothing, fur and millinery dis
trict.
The partners of the firm, Isaac Har-
ris and Max Blanck, escaped un-
scratched from the office on the tenth
floor, carrying with them over an ad-
joining roof Blanck's two young daugh-
ters and a governess. There was no
near outside fire escape on the build
ing.
Origin Unknown.
How the fire started will perhaps
never be known. A corner on the
eighth floor was it's point of origin and
the three upper floors only were swept.
On the ninth floor so bodies were
found, SO or more persons were crush
ed to death by jumping and more than
30 clogged the elevator shafts. The
loss to property will not exceed $780,
900.
Pedestrians going home through
Washington place to Washington
square at 10 minutes to 5 were scat
tered by the whizz of something rush
ing through the air before them; there
was a horrible plop on the pavement
and a body fiattened on the flags.
Four alarms were rung within Is
minutes. Before the engines could re-
spond, before the nets could be
stretched or the ladders raised, five
girls had fallen from the eighth and
ninth floors so heavily that they broke
through the glass and iron roofs of
the s%ub-cellars and crashed through
the very streets into the vaults be-
low.
Holocaust Soon Over.
In an hour the fire was out; in half
an hour it had lone it's worst; prob
ably the death list was full in 20 min
uteS.
The building stands on a corner, with
exposure on two sides, but the only
fire escape was interior, opening on a
light and air shaft. In all there were
seven exits-the single fire escape, two
freight elevators at the rear. two pas
senger elevators in front and two
stairways. All of them proved al
most useless and practically all who
escaped either climbed to the roof and
scrambled thence to the roof of the
building occupied by the American
Book company adjoining, or fed in the
first rush for safety before the crush
and the smoke grew too thick.
The first rush of flame was almost
an explosion. Operators died in their
chairs, their lungs scared by inhaling
flames. Others were crowded into the
elevator shafts after the cars had
made their last trip. Still others were
pushed off in the inadequate interior
fire escape.
Shower Of Bodies.
In such a horrible stream did the
bodies overflow from the windows that
the fire nets, stretched by the first
company to arrive, were soon gorged
beyond capacity.
1t was IS feet from the eighth floor
to the ground; about So feet from the
ninth floor, lis feet from the %cornice
of the roof, and the upward rush of
the draught and the crackle of the
flames drowned their cries.
Six girls fought their way to a
window on the ninth floor over the
bodies of fallen fellow workers and
crawled u in single file to an eight
inch stone ledge, running the length
Of the building. More than a hundred
feet above the sidewalk they crept
along their perilous pathway to a
swinging electric feed wire spanning
Washington Place. The leaders paused
for their companions to eaten up at
the end Of the ledge and the six
grabbed the wire simultaneously. 1t
snapped like rotten whip cord and
they crashed to death.
Their Last Embrace.
At a ninth floor window a man and
a woman appeared. The man en-
braced the woman and kissed her.
Then he hurled her to the street and
jumped. Both were killed. Five girls
smashed a pane of glass. dropped in a
struggling tangle and were crushed
into a shapeless mass.
One girl jumped into a horse blan-
ket held by firemen and policemen.
The blanket ripped like cheese cloth
and her body was mangled almost be-