Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1913-08-06
NATIONS CAPITAL
SWEPT BY GALE
CyCIonic Storm Kills Three and
Hats Government.
PRESIDENT is ENDANGERED
White House Windows Crash In as
TumuIty Rushes Chief Executive
to safety-CapitoI Employees
in Panic-Loss Is Big.


lost their lives, scores were injured
and many small buildings were de-
molished and large property loss
was caused by a terrific wind, rain
and hail storm which swept Washing
ton Wednesday, The wind blew sew
enty-two miles an hour and more than
one and one-half inches of rain fell In
an hour. The din in the senate cham
Der was so great that recess was or
dered. The property loss is heavy.
For half an hour the city covered,
paralyzed, under the beating of the
storm, every activity suspended. Troll
ley and telephone service and street
traffic were halted and the govern
mefIt departments suspended opera
tons.
The wind wrecked three-story
brick Office building occupied by the
B. S. Saul company real estate deal
ers. and fifteen persons were carried
down in the crash. w. E. Hilton,
vice-president Of the real estate com
pany; Thomas B. Fealey, sixty-five
years old, a clerk and an unidentified
man who entered the building to try
to rescue those caught in the wreck,
were taken from the debris dead.
Half a dozen were taken to hospitals
seriously injured. Other bodies may
be recovered.
The neatly kept lawns of the White
House were devastated. Three huge
elal trees, uprooted by the wind, were
thrown bodily across the lawn and up
to the very porttco OF the building,
blocking the drives. President Wilson
was seated in the executive offices
when the wind crashed through sew
eral windows in the White House
proper. Secretary Tumulty hurried
the president and Representative Kor-
bly, of Indiana, with whom he was con-
fering, to a sheltered interior room,
away from the searching lightning
flashes.
The capitol, set high above the city,
caught the brunt of the wind, rain,
hail and lightning The senate was
In session when the hail swept
down with a deafening roar, beating
on the glass roof of the chamber. The
tumult made further business impos-
sible, and the senate quit work in
confusion for fifteen minutes.
When the storm broke, 35 painters
were at work on the dome of the
capitol, swarming over the curving
surface or swinging high on shaky
scarfolding. William Reese, the fore
man, hurried to the dome and got most
of his men to shelter inside the big in
verted bowl But Jim Boyle. John
Ford, Noble Bailey and Bruce Jones
were too late. When the storm was
over they crept, shaken and bruised, to
safety inside the dome.
In some of the office buildings and
the government departments disas-
trous panics were parrowly averted
At the bureau of printing and engrav-
ing. where hundreds of women are en-
ployed, the wind, sweeping through
huge window, sent a hall of broken
pIate glass crashing over the big press
room.
Eight or ten women were cut by
falling glass and one printer, John
Rhodes, received severe scalp wounds.
The crash of glass swept panic
through the big room.
While the excitement was at its
height the wind caught a bundle OF
900 one dollar bills, half finished, and
swept it through the broken window.
All but s75 worth of the bills were re-
covered.