"Lest We Forget": Chicago's Awful Theater HorrorEverett, Marshall
History
"Lest We Forget": Chicago's Awful Theater Horror
Everett, Marshall
Iroquois Theater, Chicago -- Fire, 1903; Theaters -- Fires and fire prevention
"But my face betrayed me. The news had paled me, and my father, suspecting
something was wrong, insisted, and I told him. He refused to believe it
and went to the telephone to satisfy himself. In five minutes he heard the
worst. Then he collapsed and sobbed like a child. For eight hours we sat
up waiting for full particulars, and at 3 o'clock Thursday morning, when
father went to bed, he was almost a nervous wreck."
ALL KENOSHA IN MOURNING.
Next to Chicago the blow of death at the Iroquois fell heavier on Kenosha,
Wis., than any of the other cities whose residents perished in the
disaster. Two of the leading manufacturers of the city, Willis W. Cooper
and Charles H. Cooper, and the children of Mr. and Mrs. S. H. Van Ingen
were among the dead.
Kenosha was in deep mourning. Trade was practically suspended and the
people gathered on the streets in little groups discussing the one topic.
Four bodies were brought to the city on the evening train, and a crowd of
over a thousand people gathered at the railway station, and walked in
silence through the streets behind the hearses. All the bodies were taken
to the morgue, from which place they will be removed to the stricken
homes.
FIVE OF ONE FAMILY DEAD.
The story of the wiping out of the children of H. S. Van Ingen, the former
manager of the Pennsylvania Coal Company in Chicago, and a resident of
Kenosha, is one of the saddest stories of the tragedy. Following the
custom established years ago, Mr. and Mrs. Van Ingen and their five
children, Grace, twenty-three years old; Jack, twenty; Edward L.,
nineteen; Margaret, fourteen; and Elizabeth, nine, had all come to Chicago
for a matinee party. Schuyler, another son, the sole survivor of the
children, was to join the family for a dinner and family reunion at the
Wellington hotel after the matinee. The seven persons were seated in the
front row of the balcony when the panic ensued, and Mr. Van Ingen,
marshaling his little force, started for the exit at the aisle, but the
mighty crush of people separated the parents from the children, and Mr.
Van Ingen, putting his arm around Mrs. Van Ingen, carried her one way,
while the children were swept the other.
The last Mr. Van Ingen saw of the children was when Jack, the oldest boy,
took his little sister, Elizabeth, in his arms and shouted to his father:
"You save mother and I'll look after the rest." In another moment the
party, including the children, was trampled down.
Mr. and Mrs. Van Ingen started to return to the theater for the children
and both of them were fearfully burned in the attempt. The bodies of the
two boys were located in the evening. Margaret and Elizabeth were found
the next day. Grace, the oldest daughter, and one of the best known young
women of Kenosha, was identified still later. Mr. and Mrs. Van Ingen, both
terribly burned, were taken to the Illinois Hospital.
COOPER BROTHERS DEEPLY MOURNED.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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