Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 36, Number 114, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 September 1904 — SCHOOL GIRLS PERISH IN VAULT [ARTICLE]

SCHOOL GIRLS PERISH IN VAULT

Mine Dead and Mor* Than a Score of Others Escape Same Fate. During the forenoon recess Friday of the PJeoaant Ridge school, seven miles north of Cincinnati, nine school girls were suffocated in a vault, while more than a score of others narrowly escaped the same horrible death. During the rest of the day the suburb was wild with mingled excitement, sorrow and indignation and those openly charging the calamity to official negligence made serious threats, among them being many women. When the recess was given about thirty of the smaller girls, all from the primary grades,.were in the outhouse assigned to them, when suddenly the floor gave way, precipitating them into a vault twelve feet deep and walled up with stone like a wall. There was four feet of water or filth, that would have been over the heads of the girls falling in it singly, but those falling foremost filled up the vault so that others were not entirely submerged. The girls fell eight feet from the flooring before striking the filth an<f the struggles of those who were on top kept at least nine underneath until they were dead. The frame sheds over these vaults were about twenty feet square, without windows and with only one narrow doorway so that only one little girl escaped from the door. She ran into the school building and told the teachers what had happened. Principal T. L. Simmerman and the other teachers rushed to the rescue. The women gave the alarm about the vicinity, while Principal Simmerman secured a ladder on which the drenched girls climbed but, most of them fainting as soon as they reached the surface. The •creams of the girls were dimly heard while within the vault, and they were most of them unable to speak when res- ■ cued. The teachers were soon re-enforc-ed by the entire population of the town, the police and fire departments rendering most effective service. Those able to climb out on the lad-> ders themselves were rescued by Principal Simmerman, who finally fainted. Then others went into the vault and kept bringing out dead bodies until the vault was cleared. The firemen drained the vault so as to be sure that the rescue was complete. Those engaged in the rescue work recite the most ghastly experiences. Even those rescued alive presented such an appearance as to make many in the crowd of spectators faint, but the sight within the vault beggared all description.