Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-12-10
NINE PERSONS LOSE
LIVES WHEN BLAZE
DESTROYS STUDIO
New York Company Was
Prepared to Film Miniature
Musical Review.
OFFICIALS ARE UNABLE
TO FIX CAUSE OF FIRE
Many Are Injured When Flames
Spread Rapidly in Three
Story Building.
BY the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press.
NEW YORK, December 10.-Nine
persons are known to have been killed
and several others are missing in a fire
which swept a threc-story brick studio
of the Manhattan Studios, Inc, and
the Pathe Motion Picture Exchange at
Park avenue and One Hundred and
Thirty-Fourth streets today.
The identified dead are: Harold
Bishop AL Kramer, Bob Mussman and
Jack Quinn.
The injured:
William Mullarkey, As, burned on left
hand; Stabley Vinal, 20, injured on
left hand; Daniel Vancura, SO, burns
woman, first name Virginia Oast name
undeterminedD, "a years old, S feet 5
inches in height, weighing 125 pounds,
blonde, suffocation and burns; Daniel
Carey, 80, burns; Carl Eveas, SO. frac-
tured left ankle; Morris Roche, 36.
burns OH arms and forehead; Richard
Stradling. 80, of Yonkers, burns on
both arms and forehead.
Most of the injured were taken to the
Harlem Hospital.
About rs persons were in the building
when the fire of undetermined origin
was discovered shortly before 10 O'Clock.
Led by inflammable film the flames
quickly made an inferno of the interior
Of the small brick building. Many
barely saved their lives by jumping
from windows.
Four Alarms Sounded.
Four fire alarms brought all avail
able apparatus from upper Manhattan
and the Bronx. Several fireboats
played streams on the flaming building
from the nearby Harlem River.
The studios are located on the flats
beside the Harlem River In o district
populated mostly by colored people.
Several coal pockets are located nearby
on the Harlem and the main lines Of
the New York Central Railroad, raised
on an elevated structure, run within 100
feet of the studio.
Several thickly populated five and six
story tenement buildings adjoin the
studio.
The stage was set in the rear of the
first floor of the studio and Eddie"
Elkins, orchestra leader, had his IA
musicians in position to start the over
ture for a miniature review. produced
by Harry Delmar. On the second floor
about 80 women, in costume, were In
their dressing rooms awaiting the call
of the director.
With cameras in position, director
ready and cast awaiting the call to
shoot" there was a flash from a black
velvet drop in the rear of the stage.
Flames followed. The studio crew, ac-
cording to reports made to the police,
uncoiled line of hose and started to
fight the blaze.
The fire spread with such rapidity.
however, that one of the studio en-
ployes ran to the street and pulled an
alarm box.
BY the time the fire engines arrived
the studio building was a mass of
flames and huge billows of acrid smoke
was pouring from the structure, smart
ing the eyes of persons in the vicinity.
AmbuIances Called.
Deputy Fire Chief Dougherty imme-
diately sounded second, third and fourth
alarms, bringing apparatus from the
Bronx and many parts of Manhattan,
ambulances and police emergency
squads and reserves.
When the studio employees realized
that the flames were too much for them
they shouted for every one to flee from
the building. The performers in the
dressing rooms fed down the stairs
and into the street, where they were
given refuge in nearby Offices.
When firemen finally were able to
make their way into the building they
came upon the bodies of the five men
and four women who were trapped.
John c. Finn. vice president of the
Pathe Co., was seated in his office on
the second floor with his secretary,
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