People's Pilot, Volume 4, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 February 1895 — BIG FIRE AT INDIANAPOLIS. [ARTICLE]

BIG FIRE AT INDIANAPOLIS.

Flame* in Denlaon Hotel Beyond Control —Two Firemen Injured. Indianapolis, Ind., Feb. 7. —A few minutes after 10 o’clock this morning fire broke out on the fifth floor of the Denison hotel. In the southeast corner. The entire fire department answered the alarm, but owing to the intensely cold weather the firemen were handicapped from the start. The Denison hotel is located at Ohio and Pennsylvania streets and is the largest hotel In the city, having 300 guest rooms. It • is five stories high and occupies the full northwest quarter of the square. The hotel quickly filled with smoke, but the guests proceeded to leave quietly and no panic resulted. The hotel was full of guests. It at once became apparent that the fire would be a stubborn one. For a time it seemed as though the flames would spread to theGrand opera house, immediately across the alley south, and to the Empire theater, In the rear. Fireman Frank Nutter and Electric Lightman Patrick Ryan were knocked from a ladder forty feet high by a piece of falling cornice. Both men were picked up insensible. Nutter is probably fatally injured and Ryan seriously. The flames are still confined to the southeast portion, of .the building, though the fire is not by any means under control. The hotel is valued at $400,000 and the loss thus far is estimated at close to SIOO,OOO. When it came known that the Denison hotel wßs burning the legislature. Ip session in the capita, immediately adjourned and' many members who are living at the hotel rushed thither to save their families and personal effects.