Chicago's Awful Theater Horror Part 55

Blankenberg, Gehrmann & Co., notions, $125,000.

Leo Keene & Co., women's cloaks, and Henry Pretzfelder & Co., boots and shoes, $125,000.

Peter Rohe & Son, harness manufacturers, $125,000.

James Roberts Manufacturing company, plumbers' supplies, $100,000.

R. J. Anderf & Co., boots and shoes, and James Robertson Manufacturing company, storage, $100,000.

L. Grief & Bros., clothing, $150,000.

Maas & Kemper, embroidery and laces, $125,000.

Within 72 hours of the start of the fire the people of Baltimore were giving thought to reconstruction. After an investigation it was announced that the vaults of the Continental Trust company, which contained securities to the value of $200,000,000, were intact and that most of the great bank and safety deposit vaults escaped destruction. To relieve banks and citizens from the embarra.s.sment of financial transactions the next ten days were declared legal holidays in the commonwealth of Maryland.

Mayor McLane reflected local public sentiment when he sent out the following declaration to the world at large:

"Baltimore will now enter undaunted into the task of resurrection. A greater and more beautiful city will rise from the ruins and we shall make of this calamity a future blessing. We are staggered by the terrible blow, but we are not discouraged, and every energy of the city as a munic.i.p.ality and its citizens as private individuals will be devoted to a rehabilitation that will not only prove the stuff we are made of but be a monument to the American spirit."

With the exception of the Baltimore World all the local newspapers suffered the loss of their plants, moved their staffs to Washington and issued editions regularly from there devoted to Baltimore news. The World, published in the thick of the ruin and desolation, gave voice to its sentiment in the following editorial:

"G.o.d be merciful unto those who suffered from the awful calamity that swept down on Baltimore.

"Tongue fails; pen is inadequate and refuses to comprehend the extent of the disaster that has overtaken us. We have heard of awful calamities to others; in fancied security we have looked on in sympathy while others have suffered. Now the pain, the anxiety, the suffering is ours and we stand appalled, unable to realize the immensity of the terrible affair.

"The World is the only newspaper office in the city that is standing. Once it was on fire and was saved only by the earnest, valiant and courageous work of the World employes and the goodness of G.o.d. To our suffering contemporaries we extend the greatest sympathy and to the hundreds of other sufferers also. For those thousands who are thrown out of work in the dead of winter, with sorrow and suffering staring them in the face, our heart throbs with a feeling that we cannot express. All we can say is, 'G.o.d help them.'"

Local and national military authorities took immediate charge of the situation to prevent looting and disorder, possible because of the vast sums of money in the various safes and vaults scattered about in the ruins. Recognition of the disaster came from the nation in another practical form. A bill was promptly and appropriately introduced in Washington by Representative Martin Emerich of Illinois reciting the destruction by fire in preamble and then continuing:

Whereas, The fire has so crippled the merchants and business interests in the City of Baltimore that they are unable adequately and properly to provide and care for the many who are rendered homeless and penniless by this calamity, and

Whereas, The City of Baltimore and its people are probably unable in the face of the unlooked for catastrophe to provide proper means for effectually checking the fire and promptly to remove the embers and debris; and

Whereas, The same, while remaining, are constantly a menace to the safety of many citizens, it is enacted that the Secretary of the Treasury be authorized and directed to pay upon the order of the City Council of Baltimore, certified by the Mayor of the city, to any designated authority of said city, any necessary sum of money not exceeding the sum of $1,000,000 out of any money in the treasury of the United States not otherwise appropriated, to be used for the purpose of providing shelter for those rendered homeless by the said fire, and also to be used for the purpose of clearing the streets and localities devastated by the fire and in order to render the city available for the use of residents and others as speedily as possible.

The bill was referred to the committee on appropriations.

Two days after the fire insurance men estimated the loss at $125,000,000 and the insurance carried at $90,000,000.

For the thousands of clerks and other employes whose positions are gone forever there seemed to be nothing before them but to move to other cities.

In the work of rebuilding came employment for another army, but it offered no avenue of escape to those whose doom was sounded by the explosions of dynamite and the crash of falling walls. Few of the men were fitted for the heavy labor of the building trades.

Baltimore's great wholesale houses and wharf district have been ruined--not irrevocably, but to such an extent that the fear grips the heart of every Baltimore business man that the city may be unable to recover from it for many years.

Amid ruins still hot and smoking Baltimore began its resurrection and made known its determination to rise, Phoenix-like, through its own efforts, by politely, yet firmly declining proffers of help that poured in from all sides. The blow that befell Baltimore aroused an intense civic pride that found expression in an effort to work out its own salvation. In declining financial a.s.sistance Mayor McLane was actuated by the spirit shown by the Chamber of Commerce, Stock Exchange and practically every local commercial body, which came forward with offers of all the money needed by the city for immediate use. It was decided that should the Herculean task prove too great for the munic.i.p.ality there would still be ample time to seek outside a.s.sistance.

While heavily armed soldiers marched about the blistering ruins with stately tread holding back those who only a few hours before had fought the police to save their valuables at the risk of their lives, the latter--energetic business men--were already preparing to re-open their establishments. Old buildings, long unused, private residences near the business section, in fact, every available structure to be secured blossomed forth within 24 hours with crudely lettered signs on board or cloth announcing that within was the temporary office of a firm. The names on some of these signs were those that rank high in the financial and commercial circles of the world, and in these temporary offices men who for years have known only mahogany desks worked on cheap tables and plain boards.

One of the surprises of the fire was the discovery after the excitement was over that two financial concerns whose homes were directly in the path of the flames escaped practically unharmed. These were the Mercantile Trust company and Brown Brothers' Bank. The escape of these buildings was due to their lack of height. They do not exceed four stories, and as they were surrounded by lofty structures the flames swept over them.

Unconcealed joy greeted the discovery and the information that millions upon millions in securities in various vaults escaped destruction, whereas all was at first believed to have been swept away. Practically all of the vaults and strong rooms and safes of the financial concerns whose buildings were destroyed were found unhurt. A tremendous loss in securities had been antic.i.p.ated at first, and when vault after vault yielded up its treasures unharmed the joy of the guardians was boundless.

From one trust company's safes alone papers to the amount of more than $200,000,000 were recovered. Merchants and their a.s.sistants, smoke soiled and begrimed and hollow-eyed from anxiety and loss of sleep, worked like laborers in the smoking ruins to uncover their safes, and in nearly every instance they were rewarded by intact contents.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MRS. L. H. MELMS, 117 GROSVENOR AVENUE, CHICAGO.

Mrs. Melms was before her marriage an Athens (O.) girl and was a great favorite there. For a number of years she conducted a millinery store in that place, her maiden name being Blanche Cornell.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MRS. CHARLES F. BOETTCHER, 4140 INDIANA AVENUE, CHICAGO.

Mrs. Boettcher was the wife of Charles F. Boettcher, a butcher on the south side. She was the only one of the family who perished in the fire.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MISS MELISSA J. CROCKER, 3730 LAKE AVENUE, CHICAGO.

Miss Crocker was for seventeen years a teacher of the higher grades in the Oakland school, coming to Chicago from Princeton, Ill. She attended the theater with a friend, Mrs. L. H. Pierce, and little girl of Plainville, Mich. All were lost.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MRS. EMMA STEINMETZ, 2541 HALSTED STREET, CHICAGO.

Mrs. Steinmetz was fifty-one years of age and the wife of O. T. P.

Steinmetz. She was born in Galena, Ill., her maiden name being Emma Garner.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MRS. WM. C. LEVENSON, 268 OGDEN AVENUE, CHICAGO.

This victim of the Iroquois fire, 28 years of age, was a Russian by birth, and left a husband and two children. The latter were girls, four and two years of age, respectively.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MARY HERISH, 710 SO. HALSTED STREET, CHICAGO.

A Russian girl, only eighteen years of age. She was one of only three or four of that nationality to lose her life in the disaster.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: LUCILE BOND, 4123 INDIANA AVENUE, CHICAGO.

Daughter of Mr. and Mrs. George R. Bond, and granddaughter of Benjamin Moore, ten years of age. Her mother did not attend the matinee and her father was absent in Nome, Alaska, where he holds a government position.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: SIBYL MOORE, HART, MICH.

Daughter of Mrs. Perry Moore, 13 years old, who also perished in the fire, and granddaughter of Benjamin Moore. At the time of the calamity her father was on his way home from Nome, Alaska.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE DEE CHILDREN, 3133 WABASH AVENUE, CHICAGO.

The three children of William Dee attended the matinee with their nurse.

Louise was two years of age and the two boys, twins, Edward Mansfield and Samuel Allerton Dee, were seven years old. Eddie (the boy to the right of the group) and his baby sister were killed. Samuel escaped, but the nurse was found badly mangled, burned and unconscious.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: LOUISE DEE, CHICAGO.

The child of William Dee, who was killed with her brother at the Iroquois fire. She was not burned, but is supposed to have been suffocated or died of shock and exposure.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MRS. MARY W. HOLST, 2088 VAN BUREN STREET, CHICAGO.