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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 0:52:47 GMT -5
THE O'HANLON MONUMENT _____________________________________
It Will Be Unveiled with Impressive Ceremonies on Memorial Day
Yesterday afternoon a meeting of the committee on the O'Hanlon monument had a meeting at the Chemical engine house, all being present. It was reported that the monument has been for a week on the way and is expected in the city to-day or to-morrow. On motion it was decided to formally unveil and dedicate the name on Memorial Day, Monday, May 30. A parade will form in Bagg's square and proceed to St. Agnes cemetery, in which, not only the Utica department, but the firemen from several other places will be invited to join. On motion George E. Dunham was chosen to preside at the exercises in the cemetery.
The intention is to make the occasion of the unveiling and dedication imposing and memorable. Already several companies have signified their willingness to accept the invitation. At a meeting of the Exempts to-morrow night that organization will take some action looking toward the entertainment of the guests. The Police and Fire Board will also be invited.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 0:53:27 GMT -5
On motion Messrs. Dimbleby, Gartheide, Meyers, Dacey and Dunham were appointed to a committee of arrangements.
A gentleman who has seen the monument and knew O'Hanlon, says the statue of the fireman bears a close resemblance to him and is even more accurate than the committee anticipated. Memorial Day was selected for the unveiling of the monument in order that as many as possible might be present. Almost every one in Utica knew and liked John O'Hanlon and would be glad to join in doing honor to his memory. The foundation for the monument is already on the lot in St.Agnes cemetery, and it is thought that very few days will be necessary to put the base and statue in place. The procession will probably form in Bagg's square about 2 o'clock in the afternoon, proceeding up Genesee, over Hopper, Rutger and Mohawk streets to the cemetery.
The committee at its meeting yesterday selected Hon. James S. Sherman to deliver the address on the occasion of the unveiling of the monument. A telegram of invitation was sent and last evening a telegraphed acceptance was received. This insures an eloquent oration. The committee will secure the attendance of some of Utica's best singers and vocal music will form an attractive feature of the programme. That the ceremonies will be appropriate and interesting is certain. There are thousands in Utica who will wish to be present to pay their tribute of respect to one of the bravest firemen any department has ever known.
Utica Daily Press 1898
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Post by fiona on Apr 17, 2009 9:26:30 GMT -5
Dave, I owe you a serious reply about cival lawsuits, because it was a good question. I don't mean to makelight of this thread. I actually have not read of any. What I have read, from the beginning, that many of the residents of the GF respected Mr. Latcher and Mr. Northrup and wanted them to rebuild as quickly as possible, so they could reclaim their apartments. It is a fact that many of them moved into his other buildings, and then, into the Kanatenah, when it was opened. I have also read that when the Olbiston opened two years later, many of the residents of the GF went to live there. I tried to find a list of names in the city directory, 1898, but the style of listings had changed. Given the fact that most, if not all, of these people were of the same status ecomonically, and socially, and moved in the same social circles, it would have been an unthinkable slap in the face to the Latchers, especially Mrs. Latcher and Mrs. Northrup, and may have meant becoming a social outcast, in other words, "not being recieved." From what I have read on Victorian mores and beliefs, I find this probable. Second, these people were shellshocked, just keeping body and soul together, would have been enough. I am sure that the ladies in their parlours gossiped about it, and many persons would have wanted to. If you or Jhon can find anything, that would be fantastic. If I come across anything, I will post it.
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Post by dgriffin on Apr 17, 2009 13:35:43 GMT -5
Jon, is this the statue of the standing fireman in about the middle of St. Agnes Cemetery? My father revered that statue, as did all Utica firemen. He took us there when we were quite young and I would always pass by it when I got a bit older and rode through the cemetery on my bike.
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Post by dgriffin on Apr 17, 2009 13:38:56 GMT -5
Thanks, Fiona. You make a good point about society in that era and place. And of course, people weren't as "sue happy" then, possibly. N&L may have made good on lost and uninsured goods to many of the apartment dwellers. But "Annie" was lucky to escape with her satchel, shoes on the wrong feet or not, because she may have not received the same treatment as the apartment owners.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:50:10 GMT -5
FIREMAN KILLED _______________
Two Members of the Utica Department Perish _____________________
A Wall Falls In and Buries Them-John O'Hanlon and Isaac Monroe the Victims-Half a Dozen Others Injured-Property Loss Only $20,000
Two firemen lost their lives in the burning of the store and warehouse of the commission house of the N. E. White company, 26 Broad street, Tuesday afternoon. The dead are:
Isaac Monroe 163 Columbia street, call fireman No 4 company, crushed under the falling roof and suffocated.
John O'Hanlon , 200 Whitesboro Street No. 4 company crushed under the falling roof and suffocated.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:50:59 GMT -5
The injured are:
Horace Nole, 232 Dudley avenue, No. 5 company cuts about the legs and head by falling bricks.
William F. Byrnes, 23 Taylor avenue call fireman, No. 5 company, head cut by falling bricks.
George J. Voght, 305 South street, call fireman No. 5 company, face and hands cut by falling bricks.
William F. Bull, 10 Union avenue call fireman No. 5 company, cut over eye by falling bricks.
John J. Lynch Downer avenue, No, 3 company, leg injured by falling beam.
The loss is $20,000. Daniel N., John M. and Charles B. Crouse place the loss on their building at $10,000, fully insured. The insurance on the entire block is $30,000.
The loss on the N. E. White company's stock is $10,000. The company holds $9,000 insurance.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:51:35 GMT -5
The Crouse building is a four story brick structure standing at the north-east corner of Broad and John streets, It is an old building, constructed entirely of brick and wood, without steel supports or girders. Three of the four stores of the block are occupied by the wholesale grocery house of John M. Crouse & Son. The store on the east end of the building was occupied by the commission house of the N. E. White company, of which T. Harvey Ferris is president and N. Edward White id secretary and treasurer. The first floor was used as a store. The second, third and fourth floors, with the exception of an office room on the second, were used for the storage of baled hay and shavings, flour, feed, butter, eggs etc. The two upper floors were filled with hay and shavings in bales and sacks of feed. Fifteen tons of feed had just been stored away on the fourth floor. The bales were piled from floor to ceiling, with only narrow passageways left between. The weight of all this stock was high up in the tons. It was highly inflammable, and when soaked with water its weight was increased many fold.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:52:22 GMT -5
Mayor Gibson was standing on Genesee street at the foot of his office stairway at 1 o'clock. He was holding his wheel, ready to go home for lunch, and talking with a newspaper man. Glancing over Broad street he saw a great volume of smoke pouring out of the third floor windows of the east end of the Crouse block.
"There's a fire in the Crouse store," he exclaimed. "I'll run over and turn that box."
The mayor stood his wheel against the curbstone in front of his office, ran across Government square and turned in the alarm from the box in front of Franklin street. He ran on down Broad street to the White feed store. Up the stairs, two steps at a time he ran, meeting Mr. White with an armful of books and papers.
"Here take these," cried Mr. White, turning the bundle over to Mr. Gibson.
The mayor carried the books and papers out of the building and across to C. K. Frey's photograph studio. The street was filling with people. A boy had turned in a second alarm from box 1223, and a telephone call had been sent in by James Hanley of Bowen & Kelley's restaurant. The result was a general alarm. Just six minutes after the mayor had opened the box a stream from No. 2 steamer was playing on the fire, the hose being coupled to the main building hydrant.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:53:03 GMT -5
The fire grew rapidly. The big clouds of black smoke were followed by flames and the windows burst outward, while the alarm bell was still ringing. The tons of hay and shavings on the third floor were a mass of flames. The fire must have been burning back among the bales for some minutes before it was seen. Streams were soon pouring in on the fire from all directions. With the arrival of the truck a stream was poured into the windows of the third floor, while the hose from the chemical was carried up into the office and the fire was fought underneath. The aerial truck was placed on John street, cut the telephone and telegraph wires, raised the ladder to the roof and carried the hose over to the top of the burning store. No. 5 hose was attached to the hydrant at Bebb's cigar store and the stream directed at the fire from a ladder in the alleyway in the rear of the building, leading from John street. Another ladder was run up beside No. 5, conveying No. 3 hose to the windows in the rear. Water was drawn by No. 3 streamer from the canal east of the John street bridge. No. 1 home was attached to the hydrant at N. F. Marcin's store and the stream was used at the Broad street side. No, 4 hose was carried up thro the store from Broad street direct to the fire.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:53:40 GMT -5
Nothing could stay the progress of the flames thro the feed store. Thousands of gallons of water under the 30 pounds hydrant pressure was poured in from front and rear, from the floors below and thro the roof above, but the flames crept thro the dry bales like a powder train. They shot thro the fourth floor into the tons of shavings piled up there. Two heavy fire walls of brick, separating the Crouse store from the White store prevented the spread of the fire beyond the single narrow store. The iron shutters and the doors in the rear were closed to prevent the fanning of the flames by a draught from below. The third floor door and the one window were left open to admit the firemen with the two lines of hose.
Half an hour after the first alarm the firemen had the flames checked. The third and fourth floors were burning fiercely but the spread of the fire to the lowest floors and adjacent buildings had been prevented. No. 5 men were working on a ladder reaching to the third floor doorway in the rear. No. 3 men were along side on a ladder reaching to the adjacent window. Both lines of hose were run in between the piles of bales. No. 3 men had one line of hose on the roof and another on a ladder on the third floor windows on Broad street. The men from the truck were at work on the roof. Away up at the front of the stairway leading to the third floor No. 4 men had their line of hose.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:54:20 GMT -5
O'Hanlon and Monroe had the line of hose from No.4 streamer up to the foot of the stairway leading to the fourth floor. They had fought the fire on the third floor and were trying to reach up to the top floor. Back of them were William E. Haselhurst and Willie Jones. While they were at work from the front the men from the ladders in trenches the men from the ladders in the rear alleyway were shooting two streams toward them, while one of the streams from the roof was raining down on their heads.
O'Hanlon came to the rear window and shouted to Servatius of No. 1 who was cutting thro the roof: "Don't throw that stream. You're wetting us. We're fighting under the stairway."
Suddenly the eastern wall of the store began to bulge and crack and the hundreds of people crowded in the rear alleyways rushed away from the burning building.
"Get out of there as soon as you can," shouted Chief Dimbleby to the men who were working from the ladders to the rear. "That wall isn't safe. Don't stop for your hose."
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:55:03 GMT -5
Assistant Chief Meyers, who was on the roof of the Crouse stores, shouted the order to No. 4 men who were working in the middle of the building and to the men out on Broad street. Chief Dacey of No. 2 pulled the hose from out of the third story window on Broad street in a hurry and carried the hose down to the first floor door. Jones and Hazelhurst came down the stairs leaving O'Hanlon and Monroe at the foot of the fourth floor stairway. Foreman Green ordered his men out of the building onto the ladder in the rear. A few seconds after Chief Dimbleby had given the warning command the firemen were out of the building, with the exception of Monroe and O'Hanlon.
Then there was a cracking and rumbling, the walls swayed and the fourth floor, with it's tons of water-soaked bales of shavings, crashed thro the building tearing the third floor completely from the walls. The roof fell with it, and the whole mass of bricks, stone, timber, tin and merchandise piled up, thro to the ground floor. The crash had come so quickly that the men on the ladders in the rear had no time to get out of the way of the shower of bricks and debris.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:56:07 GMT -5
The force of the concussion was enormous. The rear windows and doors were nearly all closed, so that the walls of the building were practically without air vents. The front wall alone furnished exit for the air. The falling floors acted like a piston, pushing the air and smoke out of the building at the bottom. The outward rush of the air made people standing on Broad street believe there had been an explosion. The first floor windows were smashed by the concussion, and Foreman Dacey of No. 2, who held a pipe at the first floor door, was knocked off his feet by the air.
The men who had the hose in the doorway jumped for the ladder. Charles Windhelm, James Curran and John Peters of No. 3 saw O'Hanlon and Monroe rush toward the window, dropping their hose by the stairway, but before they could reach the outside the falling floor from above had pinned them down. The three men from No. 3 reached ground in safety.
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Post by jon hynes on Apr 17, 2009 13:56:50 GMT -5
On the larger ladder No. 5 men were showered by the bricks. Foreman Green, his son, Vogt, Tale, Burns and Doll were on the ladder when the crash came, and slid to the ground, the Greens, Doll and Yule following. Burns has fastened himself on the ledge with a life line. Before he could slip it off he was struck by a top section of brick. His face, streaming with blood, he jumped to the ground. H. S. Stevens of Np. 5 broke his fall. Yule was injured in the leg and the head. He was taken o his home in a carriage, after Dr. D. C. Dye dressed his wounds in the Crouse office. The other men on the ladders were bruised and attended by Dr. Dye.
"Are you all right up there?" shouted Chief Dimbleby to men on the roof.
"All right up here," answered Servatius.
"Anybody hurt?"
"Bruised a little." "Where is O'Hanlon?"
"Not down here."
"Then he must be in there yet."
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