Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1914-01-14
LANTS|N
RUINS AND
3OHOMES
DAMAGED
Flames Destroying Big Whitehall
Buildings Force IS Families
From Beds.

Inc Housenold belongings or
S5 families Wednesday were
piled in heaps on the sidewalk
and in the streets, hundreds shiv
cred with the cold in empty
and roofs burned in, and two
houses, with windows broken
ruins, with loss of more than
great commercial houses lay in
quarter of a million dollars
the result of fire that swept the
four-story plants of the Cotton
States Betting and Supply Com
pany and B. f. Avery & Sons, at
Stewart avenue and Whitehall
street, IN the early morning. A
one-story frame dwelling Occur
pied by James Taylor, next door
to the plant, also was destroyed,
with most of it's contents.
Handicapped by insufficient water
pressure and the breaking of a 40
inch main on Highland avenue and
two 6-inch mains in the fire district.
firemen were forced to exert almost
superhuman efforts to prevent the fire
spreading from the double buildins
occupied by the commercial plants
and destroying scores of homes near
by.
The ravages of the fire were evil
dent Wednesday four and Ave blocks
from the buildings of the Cotton
States and Avery concerns.
80 Houses Damaged.
Thirty houses on Stewart avenue
| three blocks from the fire, caught half
dozen times, and a crew of mer
were kept busy with chemical en-
CINE and a line of hose extinguishins
the incipient blazes that threatened
to develop into a general cenfiagra-
ton at any moment.
In all of these houses the eccu-
pants were forced to flee into the
streets in their night clothing, drag
ging with them such of their be-
longings as they could. Later police
men and volunteers went into all of
the houses in the threatened district
| and carried out the furniture, piling
| 1t in miscellaneous heaps on the side
walk
rtxrr -
between the plants and Stewart ave-
nue., occupied by four families, were
| constantly in danger, and were badly
| scorched and damaged, catching fire
frequently. The building at No. 575
| Whitehall street. occupied by T. w.
Young and his family and four board
ers, caught fire three times, and sew
eral members of the family narrowly
escaped serious injury. Everything
in the house, including the pictures
on the walls, were carried into the
streets and piled in heaps. The house
will have to be repaired before it
| will be habitabIe again
| An apartment house at No SOS
Whitehall street, on the corner of
| Whitehall and Stewart, occupied by
| c. =. Taylor and his sister. Miss Ola
Taylor, and by Lott Parrish and Ora
King and their families, was badly
scorched on the side nearest the fire,
and several times the roof caught
! fire,
The fire was one of the most spec
tacular Atlanta has sen in years, and
comedy and pathos marched hand in
hand through the shooting tongues
of flames and the rolling pillows of
| smoke. Il was estimated that 5000
persons thronged the streets and roofs
of nearby houses to watch the Are.
Dog Saves Family.
| The family of T. w. Young. at No.
| SIS Whitehall street. within SO feet
of the burning buildings. were saved
from serious injury by a little pup,
the pet of 11-year- old Thelma Young,
/ The dog, sleeping in the room ocou-
pied by the little girl, awoke his lit
tie mistress by his plaintive whining
Thelma leaped 70 her feet as a
burst of flame came in at her win