The Bon Homme County independent. [volume] (Tabor, S.D.) 1904-1913, 1911-03-30
new YORK FACTORY
FIRE IS APPALLING
SCENE OF TRAGEDY
Victims, Mostly Girls, of Awful
Death in Flames, Are Now
Numbered at 141.

New York, March 2S.--Eighty- SIX
bodies Of the 14i victims of the fire
in the 1o-story loft building on Wash
ington place Saturday night have been
identified Sixteen of the bodies were
men. There are IL injured in the hos
pitfalls.
District Attorney Whitman started
an official investigation today to fix
the responsibility for the horror. Nc
arrests have been considered by the
district attorney Of any person in con-
nect1on with the fire and none will be
made until the facts disclosed in the
investigation give sufficient evidence
Tor taking such steps this afternoon
The building department was called on
for report on the burned building
that every other department that is in
any way concerned also will be re-
quired TO make a detailed report
Story Of the Fire.
One hundred and forty-oce per-
sons-nine-tenths OF them girls from
the east si6e--were crushed to death
on the pavements, smothered in smoke
or burned to crisp in a factory fire
Saturday afternoon in the worst dis
aster ever known since the steamship
General Slocum was burned to the
waters edge Off North Brothers is
land in 1904.
Nearly all. IL not all. Of the victims
were employed by the Triangle Waist
company on the eighth, ninth and 10th
floors of a 10-story building, at q
Washington place, on the western
fringe OF the downtown wholesale
clothing, furniture and millinery dis
trict.
The partners OF the firm, Isaac Har.
r,s and Max Blanck, escaped unscatheC
from the office on the 10th floor carry
ing with them over an adjoining ROOF
Blanck's two daughters and a govern
ess. There was not an outside fire
escape on the building.
corner on the eighth floor was the
fires point Of origin, and the thret
upper floors only were swept. On the
ninth floor so bodies were found; 6:
or more persons were crushed to deatf
by jumping, and more than 30 cloggeC
the elevator shafts. The loss to prop.
erty will not exceed 100000.
Pedestrians gong home through
Washington place to Washington
square, at 10 minutes to 5. were scat.
tered by the whiz Of something rush.
ing through the air before them
pavement and a body flattened on the
flags. Wayfarers on the opposite side
of the street shaded their eyes agains
the setting sun and saw the window:
of the three upper floors of the building
black with girls crowding to the stills.
Victims Forced to Jump.
Don't jump" Don't jump" yelled
the crowd. But the girls had no al
tentative. The pressure OF the mad
dened hundreds behind them and tn,
urging of their own fears were toe
strong. They began to fall to thu
sidewalk.
I-n,r aio.,,s ,yara rnor u,;tbin 1.
minutes. Before the engines could re-
spond, before the nets could b,
stretched or the ladders raised. fiv,
girls had fallen from the eighth anC
ninth floors so heavily that they broke
through the glass and iron roofs o.
the subcellars and crashed through the
very streets into the vaults below. IL
an hour the fire was out. in a hal
hour it had done it's worst; probably
the death list was complete in 20 min
utes.
The building stands on a corner will
exposure on two sides, but the onl!
fire escape was interior. opening int
light air shaft. In all there were
seven exits-the single fire escape. tive
freight elevators at the rear, two pas
senger elevators In front and TIVE
stairways.
Died Where They Sat.
lie ilISl vi iioihC was aiiuoS
IN explosion. Operators died in 'theil
chairs. their lungs scared by inhalint
flames Others were crowded into thu
elevator shafts after the cars hat
made their last trip. Still others wer'
pushed off the inadequate interior fir'
escape.
In such horrible stream did thu
bodies overflow from the windows tina
the fire nets, stretched by the frs
company that arrived, were sooi
gorged beyond capacity. Twelve bod
les weighted one net to the burstin,
point, but the bodies kept on tumblint
to the pavement, through meshes tina
could no longer support them.
When the first breath of flame curlet
over the edge Of pile of shifting Oh
the eighth floor, five minutes befor
auiting time, hundreds were In line be
fore the cashiers window.
In the office buildings across Wash
ngton place scores of men detained
beyond office hours worked at thei
desks. One Of them saw a girl rush q
a window and throw up sash. be
hind her danced a seething curtain o
yellow flame. She climbed to the gil
stood in black outline against the lsh'
hesitating. then with last touch
futile thrift, slipped her chatelaine Gal
over her wrist and jumped. Her bod.
went hiring downward through tn
woven wire glass Of canopy to the flag
cling below. Her sisters who foloWc'
flashed through the air like rockets.
It was IS feet from the eighth 400
TO the ground, about 95 feet from tn
ninth floor, lis feet from the cornice o
the roof, and the upward rush OF tn
draught and the crackle OF the flame
drowned their cries.
Six girls fought their way TO win
dow on the ninth floor over the bodie
of fallen fellow workers and craWle'
out in single file to an eight-inch ston
ledge. running the length OF the build
ing. More than 100 feet above the side
walk they crep tlong their perilou
pathway to a swinging electric fee
wire. spanning Washington place.
Wire Snaps Like Cord.
me leaders paused for their com
panions to catch up at the end OF tn
ledge and the six grabbed the wiz
| simultaneously 1t snapped like rotte
whip cord and they crashed down I
| death.
A 1S-year-old girl hung for min
utes by her finger tips to the Sill or
tenth floor window. A tongue or ham
| licked at her fingers and she droppe
into n life net the held by hremer