Democratic Sentinel, Volume 13, Number 47, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 December 1889 — AN AWFUL HOLOCAUST. [ARTICLE]

AN AWFUL HOLOCAUST.

TERRIBLE LOSS OF LIFE AT A MINNEAPOLIS FIRE. The “Tribune” Building Burned to the Ground—Scores of Employes Imprisoned on the Seventh Floor- Seven Mangled Bodies Recovered and Others Supposed to Have Perished. [Minneapolis telegram.] About an hour before midnight fire broke out in the third floor of the Tribune newspaper building in this city and the building is a total loss, with a loss of life of fifteen or twenty and possibly more. The fire, which started on the third floor at about J’l.-80, made such rapid headway that in a very few moments tne sixty-five men working on the seventh floor found that escape was being cut off and made a dash in a body for the stairway. Forty made the run safely and got out. The rest made a frantic effort to get through the blinding smoke. Five of these were cut off at the fourth floor and jumped to the pavement. Three of them were badly hurt and the other two killed, being mangled frightfully. The fire broke out in the third floor and soon the upper stories were cut o f from the street. The building was on the corner and the only adjoining buildings were only one story in height, so that no means of escape was afforded in that direction. The flames cut off the escape of the Pioneer Press force on the sixth floor as well as the Tribune folks on the seventh and eighth. Reporter Barnes of the Pioneer Press had a narrow escape from the building and left behind him Milton Pickett, the assistant city editor and one of the oldest men in the service of the paper. Pickett was lost in the burning building. But the Tribune force suffered most. They were located higher in the builjiing and had less warning of their danger. John Olsen, the president of a Dakota college, was in the composing rooms at the time the flames broke out looking after an advertisement to be inserted in the morning paper. He jumped from one of the windows to escape the flames and met with an even more horrible death from shattered limbs and body. James F. Igoe, the night operator of the Associated Press, met with a sad death as the result of his faithfulness to his employers. He was at work on the seventh floor when the report of the fire was first received, and immediately opened his key, stating the fact to the head office at Chicago and asking for a minute’s time to investigate. Soon he returned to his instrument, apparently thinking he was safe, and told the sending operator to continue. In a moment he said he would have to “skip,” and found too late that escape was cut off. He jumped from the seventh story window, and was so badly injured that he died before reaching the hospital. He leaves a family. An old man named Pierce, a printer, was also killed. The following is a complete list of the dead and injured so far as has been ascertained; MILTON PICKETT, assistant city editor of the Pioneer Press, dead. JAMES F. IGOE, Associated Press operator, dead. EDWARD OLESON, president of the University of South Dakota at Vermillion, dead. JERRY’ JENKINSON, a printer, dead. ROBERT McOUTCHEON, a printer, dead. W. H. MILLMAN, commercial editor of the Tribune, dead. WALTER E. MILES, operator and agent of the Associated Press, dead. Willlam Lown, printer; burned on hands and face. E. C. Andrews, printer; badly burned on hands and face. George E. Worden, printer; burned on hands and face. Frank Gerber, deaf-mute printer; hands and face burned. Adam Weinsheimer, printer; hurt about the hips. Charles Ale Williams, managing editorof the Tribune, .badly burned about the head and face. W. H. Williams, foreman of the composing room, badly burned about the face and hands. S. H. Jones, Pioneer Press reporter, hands and face slightly burned. Frank Hoover, printer; burned about the heck. From twenty to twenty-five persons in addition to those whose names are given above have perished. The fire was so sudden, the means of escape so criminally inadequate, the panic so great, the advance .of the flames so rapid, that many of the men on the upper floors must have perished, but their number cannot be known until the work of excavation has ended, if indeed the exact record of fatalities can be learned even then; for in a heat so intense as that which destroyed the great building it is probable that thebones of some of the victims were consumed as completely as the woodwork of the ill-fated structure: The body of a man, caught in the ruins, is in plain sight of the crowd on Fourth street. Charles A. Smith, the elevator man, did very creditable work. After the fire broke out he made five trips (the lastwhen the shaft was actually on (Ireland saved a number of people. Smith says he smelled fire for three-quarters of an hour before he could find its location. Smith is sure that more people were burned than have been reported. He says that about five minutes before the fire was discovered' he carried two ladies to the sixth floor. They asked for the editorial rooms of the Pioneer Press. He did not take them back in the elevator and he is sure they could not have gone down the stairway. Smith also says that a tall young man with a black mustache shot him elf on the seventh floor near the composing room door. He seemed dazed by the heat ana smoke and deliberately drew a revolver and fired into his own head, falling dead. Just before he fired the shot he exclaimed: “My God! My wife!” and then the bullet did its work. Assistant Foreman Kinney also saw the man shoot himseif to escape the torture of the fire. Smith is badly burned as the result of his bravery in running the elevator at the risk of his life. He saved at least twentyfive persons. A. Frank Regensdorf, a stenographer employed at St. Paul, is reported missing. He left home Saturday evening to visit friends in this city, and it is feared that he is one of the unfortunate victims of the Tribune fire. The following is a revised estimate of the losses and insurance: Losses. Insurance. Evening Journals 35,000 8 30.000 Tribune Job Printing Co.. 55,000 9,700 Tribune! Building 100,000 100,000 Other offices in building.. 30,000 12.000 Tribune newspaper. 65,000 23,000'