Rensselaer Republican, Volume 21, Number 41, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 June 1889 — A TOWN DESTROYED. [ARTICLE]

A TOWN DESTROYED.

Ftrg Swcope Beattie from ths Few of the Earth, Causing Enormous Loss* The entire business portion of Seattle, Wash. Ter., was destroyed by fire Thanday afternoon and evening. Some turpentine caught fire in th e basement of a two story irame building, on Front and Madison streets. The Whple building was soon ablaze. The fire department responded promptly, bat could make no headway against the flames. The fire spread to adjoining buildings and within ten minutes from the time it started had developed into a conflagration. A liquor house was among the first buildings in its path-: way,and the inflammable material added to the fnry of its onward march, and it jraa but a brief time until the entire square was laid in waste. Efforts were made to confine it to this district, but this also failed, for the flames leaped across the street and in a half hour more another sqnare waa burned to ashes. From this time forth it was an irrepressible conflagration, which all the efforts made could not cheek. Losses on everything are variously estimated now at from $15,000,000 to $40,000,000. From initial points the fire spread north and south a distance cf one mile. Every newspaper office, hotel, telegraph office, railroad depot and wharf in the city was totally destroyed. The entire water front,'including all wharves and docks, commercial bunkers and railway tracks, the wholesale quarter and everything sonth of Union street and west of Becond street and reaching around to the gas works and above Fourth street on Jackson, was completely burned. It is estimated that the ■otal loss to the city in buildings alone is s easily $10,000,000, and all the personal losses will probably reach $30,000,000. Whether there is much loss of life cannot yet be ascertained. There is privation felt among the poor classes, as nearly every restaurant and grocery in ;he city was consumed by the fire. The jurat district, comprising sixty-four acres, now presents the aspect of a huge oven of burning coalß and threatens even further destruction. The firemen, reinforced hy Tacoma and Snohomicb, are on the alert. The streets all through the night were crowded with people wandering about penniless and homeess. The militia and extra police are to be seen on every corner guarding the property against thieves ana vandals. One hundreds arrests have already been made. Seattle has been one of the wonders of the new Northwest. It is situated on Admiralty Inlet, near the month of the D wanisb River, and the location is in all ways desirable. - For several years the western movement has been in this < irection, and from a population of a ittle over one thousand ten years ago, the place has leaped into metropolitan proportions. Its growth has been substantial, and whi’e there his been a “boom,” it was not of the ephemeral character peculiar to western towns. Coal and lumber are chief articles of merchandise, but the general trade is arge and covers a wide tenitorj. Seattle has its elnb houses, fine business and residence h oases, and a social life keeping pace with the material progress of he city. Texas Siftings: A scriptural quotation >y disgusted law students—“ Hang all the law and the profits.”