, 1923-07-06
DESTRUCTION OF
G0LDF|ELD -W|LI.
Be COMPLETE, IS
LATEST REPORT.
Damage Toll Piles Up as
Fire Started by Still and
Famed by Wind Is
Driven Through Town

ToNoPAH, New, July g.
Carried by a wind of hurri-
cane force that roared it's de-
france of dynamite and water.
a great fire today was sweep.
ing over the gold camp Of
Soldneld. 30 miles to the south. Hun.
dreds of refugees fed to the hills
carrying their hastily collected Of.
fects with them.
At 10 o'clock Newton crum,ev
proprietor of the Goldfieid hotel est,.
mated that the fire had lone 81. zoo.
600 damage. At that hour II bad
swept Main street from end to end.
reducing the big Cook bank and Nve
County bank buildings to heaps ~
smouldering ruin and leaving many
other blackened and smouIderinp
ruins in Its wake and had tumped
across to Columbia avenue where ~
was roaring toward the p~ostoffice and
the hotel. An attempt to dynamite
out a fire trail proved futile in the
n of the wind and the futflitv of
this endeavor was intensified by thu
virtual failure of the water supply.
The water is drawn from a spring
several miles from the town.
Thirty automobiles were burned in
the Brown and Parker garage where
the fire is said TO have started.
crumiey, who led a fire fight detail.
IA cut by Tying glass and hurt
slightly and there were unconfrmed
reports that some of the fire fighters
were buried by falling walls.
A relief committee was hastily or
ganized here before noon and rushed
several automobile loads OF foodstufrs
to the stricken town. All wire and
rail communication was cut off from
the fire area.
The last stand of the FIRE fighters
was being made before the Goldfeld
hotel. the Elks building and the post
office. Tho Goidneld Tribune plant
is near the p%ostoffice building. This
office of tho Goldheld Consolidated
Mining comany has already been de-
stroyed. Late arrivals in this town
from Goldfield said there was not a
chance to save the town.
Both the telephone company and
the Western Union offices vera
burned down Mt the beginning OF tina
fire. while frantic calls for help vera
being sent to outside towns.
Tho fire is believed to have started
in a house where Illicit liquor was
being made.
OF tho %. 900 persons who lived in
Goidfield in the great COLE days be-
fore 1910. barely a thousand arc left
but the camp a bee doing a SON
siderable business with surrounding
mining districts. Many of the old res
idences have been moved to Tonopah.
80 miles away. in the last few years,
but the substantial brick buildings re-
main. including tho Goldfield hotel.
a half million dollar structure. a short
half block AWAY from the fire: tho
Cook and company banl; building. the
Trune building. the high school and
large grammar schools.
The fire siartc in what was a part
ot the old Tenderloln district.
The fire spread rapidly and took
the Masonic. temple. which was tho
old n famous Montezuma Club
building leaped across the street and
destroyed the building that once hous-
ed Tex Richards Northern saloon,
where the fight promoter mace his
start, n took h row of frame build
ings on both sides OF Main street az
far as Ramsey. This block. from
Crooke and Ramsey streets. was ones
the center OF the camp with its sa.
looms and brokers' offices. Other
brokers had offices On Ramsey street.
RENO. Nevada, July e. The fire
at Goldfield too all telephone and
telegraph lines down and no commu-
has been had with Goldfield
since a short time after the fire
started. The last word received here
and at Tonapah was to the effect that
the fire was spreading.