MILES CITY FLOOD - 1944

 

It was "bombs away" - we're talking the genuine articles - when the ice-jammed Yellowstone River flooded Miles City, Montana, in 1944. The governor of the state, Sam Ford, requested military assistance. An Army Air Corps B-17 "Flying Fortress" dropped 250-pound bombs on the river to shatter the jam.

CENTRAL BLOCK - 1953

On Aug. 29, 1953, flames toppled the Central Block in downtown Pueblo, Colorado, and destroyed the neighboring McCarthy Building.

O.G. Pope, 88, an attorney who had an office and apartment in the red sandstone block, was the sole fatality. 

As the masonry crumbled, "We started running fast. Don't know where, just fast," said C.C. Wood, a Pueblo fire captain. 

Speaking in a 1990 interview, retired Pueblo firefighter John Mikus said the blaze "was kind of a mixed-up affair. The chiefs weren’t there as they were all at a fire chiefs’ convention. There was a new crew at the Central Station. Since they were new, they shouldn’t have gone out – they didn’t know where everything was. They even hooked onto the wrong plug."

In an interview with the Pueblo Chieftain, photographer William "Bud" Hawkins, who snapped an award-winning photograph of a falling wall, recalled: ”It wasn’t even going good when I got there. I took a lot of pictures and thought it looked like a dry run but then it took off."

The Central Block housed the Cosmopolitan and Grand hotels, the Western Union telegraph office and a variety of businesses. It was erected in 1890. The McCarthy Building was built in 1891. The structures were located at First and Main streets. 

"The Central Block was pretty tall and it was built to burn: There were offices all around the outside edge and an oval thing (ground floor-to-roof rotunda) in the middle so you could walk around on all the floors and look down," Hawkins recalled. "That was like a flue.”

Writing in Fire Engineering in 2012, Ronald Spadafora, a New York City firefighter, noted "an atrium allows the builder to take advantage of available sunlight and provide enhanced ventilation" but "also provides a horizontal and vertical pathway for fire and the products of combustion."

Mr. and Mrs. T. A. Cross, who lived in an apartment in the Central Block, were awakened by the crackling of flames, The Rocky Mountain News said, and Mrs. Cross went to Mr. Pope’s apartment to warn him.

Pope told her “this fire doesn't amount to much” and went back to his bedroom, the News said. Shortly thereafter, a firefighter said he heard Pope screaming, but couldn't reach him.

After the fire was out, firefighters requested a steam shovel to comb the ruins for Pope's remains.

The blaze started shortly after 3 a.m. and spread to a paint store, setting off hundred of gallons of paint and other chemicals. 

A spectator described it as a "giant blowtorch."

Pueblo Fire Chief Ed Chief Colglazier praised police Patrolman Raymond Marshall for rousing tenants of the Grand Hotel and Assistant Fire Chief Charles DiPalma for doing the same at the Cosmopolitan Hotel, the News said.

HAUNTING - 2020

 

Photo: Cortez Fire Protection District
Flames devoured a two-story house undergoing renovation on Highway 160 south of Cortez, Colorado, on June 3, 2020. The chief of the Cortez Fire Protection District, Jay Balfour, told the Journal newspaper: "It was going pretty strong. We had to play defense and fight it from the outside.” There were no injuries. Firefighters from Lewis Arriola, Dolores, Mancos and Ute Mountain provided mutual aid.

LIFE ON LADDER - 2023

Photo: Trinidad Fire Department
Firefighters in Trinidad, Colorado, battled a house fire on Nov. 5, 2023, with the assistance from the Hoehne Volunteer Fire Department, Fisher's Peak Volunteer Fire Department and Pinon Canyon Fire & Emergency Services.

DENVER FIRE RESERVE

Clipped article from The Rocky Mountain News, Oct. 27, 1952 

FLAGLER AIR SHOW - 1951

On Sept. 15, 1951, an aircraft performing a stunt plowed into spectators at an air show in rural Flagler, Colorado, claiming 20 lives - including 13 children and the pilot of the doomed craft.

Many other spectators suffered severe injuries.

"News of the tragedy was flashed by phone to all surrounding towns and to Denver," The Rocky Mountain News said. "Ambulances and doctors rushed from as far east as Goodland, Kan., and as far west as Denver to aid the victims.

"The injured were carried by car and ambulance to the tiny hospital here," the News said. "Dr. John Straub and Dr. W. L. McBride and a staff of volunteer workers performed yeoman tasks in rendering first aid to the injured."

Victims were transferred to hospitals in Denver, Goodland and other communities.

Flagler's population at the time was about 700. Attendance at the air show from the town and its surroundings was well above that.

The military sent "four SA-16 rescue planes from Lowry Field, loaded with doctors, first aid men, plasma and medicine, landed at the tiny site of the tragedy to join in rescue activities," the News said.

Time Magazine quoted Charlie Keller, a farmer attending the show with his wife, Kathy, teenage daughter Zenelda and 6-year-old twins Johnny and Josephine,

“I saw this plane coming. I hollered. ‘Mama, duck!’ I dived between two cars. There was an awful roar, and then this loud crash," Keller said.

"I got up. looked around. Mama wasn’t there. I couldn’t see the children either, A short time before the accident. Mama said to me. ‘Somebody could get killed.’ I remember I said, I guess somebody could get killed, Mama.’"

Keller's wife, daughter and son Johnny died.

Time Magazine noted: "Every family in town could count a member killed or hurt."

There was no grandstand. Families sat in or on cars. Show announcer Curtis Clarke was credited with preventing panic, asking male survivors to escort women and children from crash site and return to render aid, the News said.

Flagler is located in Kit Carson County and about 125 miles southeast of Denver. 

CANON CITY - 1929

Images: Pathe Newsreel, Private Collection and Rocky Mountain News

Click on diagram to view extent of damage

On Oct. 3, 1929, 13 people - both guards and inmates - died in a riot and raging fire at the Colorado State Penitentiary in Canon City, and a Catholic priest "dressed for golf" emerged as an unlikely hero through a hail of bullets.

The mutineers set blazes and raided the arsenal, but inmate trusties remained loyal to the warden and manned firehoses.

"Steadily and calmly, while the gun battle raged and during the cessation of firing, the trusties aided firemen to control the fire," The Rocky Mountain News said.

Firefighters from as far as Pueblo reinforced the Canon Fire Department as flames consumed cellblocks, the mess hall, the chapel and prison library. 

The violence delayed Canon City fire crews and police from entering the penitentiary grounds.

The Colorado National Guard also arrived.

The struggle to defeat the rioters lasted almost a day.

"The battle was marked by two attempts to dynamite the cell house walls, one blast breaking all the windows, but failing to effect a breach in the masonry," the Associated Press reported.

"The hero of the dynamiting attempts was a Catholic priest. Father Patrick O’Neill, who carried the bombs to the foot of the cell house wall, under cover of machine gun fire from the prison walls," AP said.

O'Neill, 43, was a teacher with no ties to the state penitentiary. There by happenstance, the priest made two dashes from the prison gate, each time carrying 25 pounds of dynamite. He knew nothing about explosives.

In a letter the the editor of Time Magazine, criticizing its coverage of the event, O'Neill told his story, saying: "To view my purpose as one of  'death,' rather than one of mercy to the other 160 men in Cellhouse No. 3 is rank unfairness. Women and children and men too, were scared that night. Action had to be taken; and, since I had no dependants, why I volunteered. This 'hero' stuff is also distasteful to me."

Furthermore, O'Neill wrote: "I was also dressed for golf, and was on my way to the Club, when a young lady told me her Daddy was trapped by the convicts within the Pen. 'Greater love hath no man, than a readiness to lay down his life for them.' That, and that alone was my purpose."

Even so, O'Neill was honored by the Carnegie Hero Find Commission. He lived until age 84, dying in a nursing home in Cullman, Alabama, on Aug. 16 1971, according to a brief obituary published in The New York Times. He was ordained by the Order of St. Benedict in 1915.

Photo of Father O'Neill published in Rocky Mountain News 

Text of Father O'Neill's letter to Time Magazine (Nov. 4, 1929)

Sirs:

A friend has just given me your version of the Prison Episode. I am quite surprised at your unfairness. The terms you use, and the angle you viewed, agree with a certain anonymous threat from Springfield, Mo. My friend demanded that I write you, though, for he claims that your magazine endeavors to be fair and play the game square.

"Burly" is an opprobrious term. To view my purpose as one of ''death," rather than one of mercy to the other 160 men in Cellhouse No. 3 is rank unfairness. Women and children and men too, were scared that night. Action had to be taken; and, since I had no dependants (cq), why I volunteered. This "hero" stuff is also distasteful to me. But I don't care for your readers to have the impression of a Priest wishing death in preference to life.

I am not the Chaplain at the Pen. In fact, I was never in it before, having come to Colorado in September of this year. I am Chaplain at Holy Cross Abbey, and teach Psychology and English. I have been criticised for not going in this Cellhouse and persuading them to give up. Under the circumstances, that was quite impossible. I was also dressed for golf, and was on my way to the Club, when a young lady told me her Daddy was trapped by the convicts within the Pen. "Greater love hath no man, than a readiness to lay down his life for them." That, and that alone was my purpose.

Relying on your American honesty and integrity I beg to remain,

FATHER PATRICK O'NEILL, O. S. B. Canon City, Colo.

LUCKY DUCKLING - 2024

Photo: Poudre Fire Authority
On May 5, 2024, Poudre Fire Authority firefighters rescued ducklings from a storm drain in the 4000-block of Fossil Boulevard in Fort Collins, Colorado, and reunited them with their mother. Engine Co. 5 was assigned to the call.

NEAR ZERO - 2022

Photo: Adams County Fire Rescue
Fighting fire and the weather, these Adams County, Colorado, firefighters are contending with flames, smoke and near-zero temperatures at an abandoned building at 60th Avenue and Federal Boulevard on Dec. 23, 2022. 

INTO THE ABYSS - 2023

Photo: South Metro Fire Rescue
Eerie scene at fire at Waste Connections transfer station on South Jordan Street in Centennial, Colorado, on Sept. 19, 2023.

FIRST FIRE

"Denver’s first recorded fire took place March 18, 1860, when a livery stable in Auraria burnt to the ground with a loss of $18,000" - Rocky Mountain News, Feb. 18, 1951

GLOBEVILLE - 1920

Photos: Rocky Mountain News

On Sept. 6, 1920, two Denver & Interurban Railroad interurban trains collided in the Globeville area of Denver. Scores of people were hurt. About a dozen died.

"Fifty patrolmen and two details of firemen were rushed to the scene," the Rocky Mountain News reported. "Ambulances were sent from hospitals and police headquarters."

Uninjured passengers aided in the rescue.

Passenger P.F. Zarina., whose brother died in the wreck,  described the collision to the Rocky Mountain News:

“I was riding with the motorman on the inbound Interurban ... the car was so crowded there was hardly room to breathe."

"As we rounded the long turn coming into Globeville, the conductor turned to me, white as a sheet, and stammered, ‘My God! What is that? Then the motorman shouted ‘Jump!"

 “The conductor and another of the men hit telegraph poles, and were crushed by the impact. I was lucky and hit dirt."

"As soon as I could walk I started to look for my brother. Pretty soon I found some firemen and policemen pulling him out of the wreck."

The News said pickpockets mixed in with rescuers, adding insult to injury.

DENVER - 1878

Scene of Denver in 1870s

In the 1870s, Denver was a growing "two-horse town" having been a fledgling "one-horse town" in the 1860s.

Fire and flash floods posed an existential threat, even after precautions, such brick construction and improved firefighting, were implemented after the Great Fire of 1863 and the calamity of the Great Flood that followed that.

Following is an excerpt of a first-hand account of an 1878 blaze at 15th and Wynkoop streets accompanied by a flash flood of Cherry Creek. It was published in the Denver Tribune of May 22, 1878. Sadly, we have yet to come upon photographs.

"Never did flood swell so," the Tribune reporter wrote that day. Well, perhaps that was true of 1878, however, greater calamities followed as Denver reached metropolis status by the 20th century. 

 

Excerpt from Denver Daily Tribune, May 22, 1878 

ORIENTAL REFINERY - 1955

Volunteer Firefighter Harold Hubbard of the South Adams County Fire Department suffered fatal injuries at the Oriental Refinery in Commerce City, Colorado, on April 5, 1955. Five other firefighters were hurt when a  gas-cracking furnace exploded. Bystanders and refinery workers were hurt, too. "All of the sudden, the whole damn building blew up," Assistant Fire Chief Kenneth Gahagen told The Rocky Mountain News. "It went with a whoof."  The blast also damaged the fire engine and the hose.

TURNER HALL - 1920

On July 9, 1920, a conflagration swept East Denver and water was scarce.

Flames gutted East Turner Hall, a social venue at 20th and Arapahoe streets, and spread to businesses - including an auto company and hotel - as well as houses. Sections of the hall collapsed, showering bricks and cinders.

A general alarm summoned 22 engine and truck companies, almost all of Denver's firefighting force. Police patrolman Forrest Ross carried a semi-conscious woman from the Madison Hotel, The Rocky Mountain News reported.  

Low hydrant pressure disrupted operations .

Quoted by the News, W. F. R. Mills, manager of the city water department, said: “An attempt to direct twelve hose streams from two six-inch mains would naturally tend to reduce the pressure, to say nothing of the fact that everywhere demand was being made on the mains by garden hoses used in fighting the score or more of fires that sprang up." 

Describing the initial stages of the fire, Denver Fire Chief John Healy said: "Engine Company No, 4, whose engine house is only a block from Turner Hall, responded to the alarm as soon as it was sent into the central station. It hardly took a moment for it to get to the scene, and when the combination wagon arrived they were unable to park in the alley on account of the flames flaring thru the windows."

East Turner Hall was located at 2150 Arapahoe Street. Earlier that day, firefighters contended with a major blaze at St. John's First Evangelical Lutheran Church, 1846 Arapahoe Street. Remnants of both structures are long gone. 

FIRE RESPONSE

SAVED WOMAN

CHIEF HEALY

Chief John Healy led the Denver Fire Department for 33 years - a classical smoke eater who ushered in the age of motorized fire apparatus and oversaw a dramatic expansion of the city's emergency service.

The Associated Press described the chief as "one of the best known firefighters in the country."

Healy, who immigrated from Ireland, joined the fire department in 1894 and rose to the rank of fire chief in 1912.

He was a "fireman's fireman" - directing firefighting at many of Denver's largest blazes during the early 20th Century, including the Turner Hall conflagration in East Denver on July 9, 1920.

As an assistant fire chief, Healy was critically hurt in an acid spill at the Denver Post in 1904, but returned to duty after a six-month period of recuperation in California. 

"His physician has advised a lower altitude, and his friends have prevailed upon him to take a short vacation," the Rocky Mountain News reported on Oct. 14, 1904. 

Healy also served as president of the International Association of Fire Chiefs.

It's probably safe to say he loved his job.

GROUND ZERO - 2001

Photo: FEMA

Colorado Task Force 1 assisted in the search and recovery at the World Trade Center in New York the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

THEATER DISTRICT - 1929

Photo: Denver Public Library
Denver Theater District on Curtis Street, circa 1927-1930. To the front right is the Nanking Chop Suey Restaurant, which probably did a thriving business. 

Photo: Rocky Mountain News
Firefighters, police and spectators at Quincy Building fireground at 17th and Curtis.


On Feb. 2, 1929, seven Denver firefighters were injured or overcome by chemical fumes in a two-alarm blaze at the Quincy Building at 17th and Curtis streets - in what was then known as the Theater District.

That's where the citizenry thronged to see the movies.

The fire, naturally enough, broke out in or near a stash of films, negatives and chemicals stored in the basement of the Quincy Building by Universal Studio, the Rocky Mountain News reported.

Firefighters advancing hoses into the basement were beaten back and the crew of Truck Company 10 was partially overcome, the News said. They finally cut holes in the floor and flooded the basement.

The fire drew 2,000 or more spectators and "police struggled in vain to beat the crowds back as firemen shouted warnings that an explosion might happen," the News said.

Fire Chief John Healy directed 13 downtown fire companies, assisted by District chiefs William S. Bryan, Clarence A. Hawkins, Raymond Giffords and J. Moses   

The first alarm was transmitted at 12:16 p.m, the second alarm as ordered at 12:22 p.m., and the fire was out at 3 p.m., the News said.

DENVER FIRE CLAY - 1930

Firefighters inspecting the railroad tank car, rescuer Richard Davies (inset) and Denver Mayor Stapleton at the scene of the industrial accident.

 

On Aug. 27, 1930, deadly chlorine gas escaped from a railroad tank car and drifted into the Denver Fire Clay Co. plant - causing a major industrial accident.

Twenty-three people, including 13 Denver firemen, were overcome by the yellow-colored gas, the Associated Press reported. The tank car carried 16 tons of the chemical.

J.W. Gibbs, a plant worker, donned a gas mask and closed a leaking valve, AP said.

The firemen weren't equipped with masks, AP said. The entire crew of Engine Co. 10 was felled by the fumes, the Rocky Mountain News reported.

Richard Davies, 24, a Yale University student working at the plant, hustled into the gas to administer first aid with a flask of ammonia - a chemical that can counter the effects of chlorine, the News said.

Davies said he learned that in chemistry class.

"There wasn't time to wait for doctors and ambulances, so I just dived right in," Davies, who eventually fell ill, said from his bed at Denver General Hospital. The ammonia was stored in a plant emergency kit.

The Denver Fire Clay Co. was located at 32nd and Blake streets - in the "factory district," as the News called it.  

BANK DEPOSIT - 1955

Photo: Casper Fire and Rescue
On Jan.  21, 1955, firefighters battled a blaze at the Casper National Bank in Wyoming in the bitter cold. Firefighter Ed Schwerdtfeger is on the nozzle of a 2-1/2 inch diameter hose line. Below him it looks like there's a booster line snaking into the bank.  

COLD CASE - 1997

Colorado Bureau of Investigation Files

On Jan. 27, 1997, Anthony Bunn, Susan Garrett, Vivian Garrett, Erik Waite, and Tad Wescott died in an arson fire at the Hacienda Plaza Inn, 11 E. 84th Ave., Thornton. Anyone with information is asked to call the Thornton Police Department.

READ MORE

ROCKY MOUNTAIN ARSENAL

 

The Rocky Mountain Arsenal was the scene of many-a-fire over the years and topping the list is a spectacular blaze that seared storage tanks holding deadly chlorine gas on July, 27, 1947. 

"We'd have been powerless if those tanks exploded," Denver Fire Chief Allie Feldman told the Associated Press. No injuries were reported.

The Rocky Mountain News reported a locomotive engineer, James Priller, braved the heat and moved eight tank cars laden with chlorine from a siding near the fire. The newspaper called Priller a hero.

The fire started in coal bunkers at a powerhouse near the chlorine tanks. News reporters covering the blaze were told they did so at their own risk.

The sprawling industrial complex was located in Commerce City and manufactured incendiary bombs for World War Two. After the war, a section was leased to the Colorado Fuel and Iron Co. Today, the site is a nature preserve.

Army personnel responded with eight pieces of fire apparatus kept at the arsenal, the News said. Denver sent an initial assignment of two engines and a ladder truck.. Additional Denver rigs followed. South Adams responded, too.

Feldman, Deputy Chief Patrick Boyne and Assistant Chief John Horan led the Denver firefighting force.

Other Rocky Mountain Arsenal blazes:

On Oct. 11, 1951, a gasoline bomb fuse triggered an explosion that injured nine women. Two succumbed to their injures at Fitzsimmons Army Hospital in Aurora.

On Feb. 28, 1952, fire destroyed a three-story building on the arsenal grounds operated by the Julius Hyman Chemical Company.

On July 20, 1952, a worker died in an explosion on the fourth floor of another building on the arsenal used by the Hyman company.

On Oct. 24, 1953, flames erupted at a building housing the U.S. Army Chemical Corps. The Rocky Mountain News described the blaze as spectacular "with phosphorous bombs shooting hundreds of feet into the air."   

On July 4, 1953, appropriately enough, there were more fireworks at yet another Hyman company operation on the arsenal grounds. "Flaming chemicals spurted out of pipes," The Rocky Mountain News said.

On March 17, 1954, fire destroyed a warehouse.

'IT COULD HAPPEN HERE'

On Dec. 5, 1958, a Colorado newspaper took local taxpayers to task for voting down a school construction plan and made its case citing that week's deadly school fire in Chicago.

"It Could Happen Here," the Louisville Times warned its readers after Chicago's Dec. 1, 1958 tragedy. (Louisville is located between Denver and Boulder.)

Ninety-two students and three nuns perished at Our Lady of Angels school in spite of the valiant efforts of the Chicago Fire Department, the fire patrol, police, teachers, neighbors and parents. The school was old and lacked fire escapes.

"The tragic school fire in Chicago should make taxpayers who voted down a new grade school building for Louisville stop and think," the Times said. "Most certainly it will add more worry to the mothers who every time the fire alarm goes off run out to look for smoke at the grade school and listen to see which way the fire truck takes."

About two weeks later, Louisville area firefighters held school fire drills, and the Times reported: "In the St. Louis school 163 pupils cleared the building in 75 seconds. ... At the new Fairview consolidated school where rooms all have outside doors, 485 pupils were out of the building in 65 seconds and at the old Fairview building it took 77 pupils 65 seconds to clear the building."

ST. JOE'S - 1916

On Jan. 26, 1916, a basement fire billowed smoke through Denver's St. Joseph's Hospital, causing a commotion. Patients dressed and fled by fire escape in snow. Nurses rushed mothers and babies to safety. Fumes sickened nuns and firefighters, including Chief John Healy. Firefighter George Drake crashed through a skylight - and an expectant mother, Mrs. Leo Stack, gave birth thereafter. Newspapers identified the injured nuns as Sister Mary Edwards and Sister Mary Ligouri. [Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection]

STEAMBOAT SPRINGS - 1939

Photo: Museum of Northwest Colorado

On Jan. 24, 1939, fire devoured the 100-room Cabin Hotel in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, killing two people trapped in the flames.

All that was left of the three-story frame resort was "a skeleton of charred wood and ice," the Associated Press said.

Mayor Claude Luckens and others tried to gain access but were driven out by smoke, the Steamboat Pilot newspaper reported.

The battle was lost before firefighters could get water on the blaze, which started near a chimney leading to a furnace room in the 30-year-old hotel's south wing. The volunteer fire department, under the command of Chief Lavern Nelson, was very small, with just 10 or so members. 

Remains of Merle Sweet, 71, a Strawberry Park rancher, were found on the springs of his burnt bed, the Pilot newspaper.

The body of Mildred Keltner, 24, of Meade, Kansas, was located outside her room. She worked in Steamboat Springs.

The Pilot reported hotel manager C . P . Homer "rapped on doors and called to tenants to leave the building . Then he rang the buzzers in each occupied room . It was supposed that all had left the structure."

The hotel was owned by Routt County, having been seized for back taxes.

FIREMEN CHASE FIRE - 1929

Typical Denver Milk Wagon 

Pittsburgh Press - Dec. 22, 1929 

Holiday Pursuit in Downtown Denver

By The United Press

DENVER - "Julius Caesar," a milk wagon horse with a sense of humor, and the Denver Fire Department gave Christmas shoppers a treat when they played "tag" in the main business section Saturday.

Julius, as a rule, goes about his business like any ordinary horse, but when an oil stove in the wagon exploded while the driver was delivering a bottle of milk, he broke away.

As Julius kicked up the snow in a burst of speed down a busy avenue, scattering bottles of milk, six fire trucks took up the pursuit.

The firemen "tagged" Julius after a chase of five blocks and extinguished the blaze.

 

COLFAX & BROADWAY

The Denver Fire Journal uncovered more about this most unusual fire in the Dec. 21, 1929 edition of the Rocky Mountain News.

The incident began at 20th and Broadway.

When firefighters arrived "they saw the fire careening down Broadway" and "flames and milk bottles were leaping from the doors and windows on  the wagon," the News said.

The horse and flaming wagon were corralled at Broadway and Colfax Avenue, a busy intersection near the state capitol.

"The horse suffered only from fright," the News said.

[The UP story appeared on page 2 of the Pittsburgh Press of Dec. 22, 1929]