Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1914-07-01
SALEM, MASS, FIRE
SWEEPS HALF CITY
FIERCE CONFEDERATION MAKES
10000 OF RESIDENTS
HOMELESS.
1000 BUILDINGS ARE BURNED
Property Loss Estimated at $4,000, 900
Dynamite Fails to Check Flames
-Firemen Made Helpless by
Breaking of Water Mains.

Salem, Mass, June 26.-Nearly half
the ''Old Witch city" of Salem, rich
in historic buildings and tradition,
was devastated Thursday afternoon
and night by fire that caused an
estimated loss of $40, 900, destroyed
1000 buildings, including score OF
manufacturing establishments, and
made 10000 of the $4,000 residents
homeless.
The fire originated in the korn .
leather factory on the west side OF
the city about o'clock Thursday aft
ernoon and swept through the shoe
and leather manufacturing district,
running every building in a curvlng
path two miles long and more than
half mile wide.
Block after block was dynamited
but the fire, checked in one direction,
was driven by shifting winds into new
paths of destruction.
Water Main Breaks.
At the start the water pressure was
low and when the fight became des-
perate a great water main near Bev-
erly bridge broke, leaving the firemen
practically helpless.
Meantime calls for assistance had
been sent to nearby cities and an
enormous quantity of apparatus, rang
ing from the most antiquated tubs
from towns and villages to the new
| high pressure automobile engine OF
the Manchester, N. H., fire depart
ment, responded.
The Manchester engine undertook
to pump water from the ocean. Bos-
ton, Lynn and other cities sent appa-
ratus and details of police. But the
combined efforts of the great aggrega-
ton of fire fighting machines were
futile and when darkness fell dyna-
mite was used.
Burning embers, carried by strong
northwest wind, strated fires in two
other sections, the fashionable resi-
dental district adjacent to Lafayette
street and manufacturing and tene-
ment house district of the peninsula
bounded by Palmer's cove, South river
and the water front.
Oil Tanks Explode.
Late at night brands kindled a
fourth fire in the plant of the Salem
Oil company in Mason street, north
west of the Essex county courthouse.
A terrific explosion occurred when the
oil tanks blew up, and showers of
sparks fell threateningly on part
of the town that before had not been
in imminent danger. This fire, how
ever, was checked after it had de-
stroyed the oil company's plant and
thirteen houses.
The burned buildings include the
plants of a score of manufacturing
companies, among them the big fac
tory of the Naumkeag Cotton mills,
twice as many business places, st.
Joseph's Roman Catholic church, re-
Gently erected at cost of $25O,000, the
Orphan asylum and more than 200
residences and tenement buildings.
Among these residences were colonial
homes which artists have declared to
be the finest types of that architec-
ture in the country.
The entire section occupied by the
italian and Greek colonies was de-
yastated. Most of the 1000 persons
who had homes in that district were
housed temporarily at the Y. M G. A.
building, the state armory, police sta
tions and other public buildings
Believed Under Control.
When the flames were believed to
be under control at IL o'clock Thurs
day night all the historic and literary
| landmarks had escaped destruction.
These included the Peabody museum,
Essex institute, Old Custom house,
where Nathaniel Hawthorne did much
of his literary work and "The House
of the Seven Gables" made famous by
the novelist.
At midnight the fire was burning ON
Derby street not far from the Peabody
museum, but it was thought that the
building and its valuable collection of
curios would be saved.
Several buildings we're dynam1ted
late Thursday night and it looked as
though the fire had been checked. No
fatalities had been reported up to
midnight, but in the confusion it was
Impossible to determine the casual
ties. Some fifty injured persons we're
received at the hospitals.
Thousands Of the homeless were
camped on Salem common Thursday
night and the city was policed by mi
'itiamen.