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Show B 2 DIE IN OKLAHOMA COALMINE Only Five Men Escape Explosion Explo-sion ; Dense Gas Makes Work of Rescuers Dangerous; Danger-ous; 5 Bodies Still in Mine. MoALESTER, Okla., Dec. 18 (UP) Wreaths hung upon up-on the doors of three score homes here today not the wreaths of holly and evergreen ever-green of Christmas, but drab token of mourning for 62 men who died in the blast-blackened slopes of the Old Town coal mine yesterday. While other folk placed holiday tinsel about their homes and set up Christmas candles in the windows, win-dows, the Old Town mine families prepared to light the candles of death. Rescue workers had brought 57 bodies to the surface by early afternoon. aft-ernoon. They reported five raort bodies, including two miners not previously reported, remained in the gaseous pit. Of the 67 now known to have been in the mine, five escaped the blast's fury. The joy of families of five men who escaped when the explosion roared through the workings shortly short-ly before noon yesterday, flashed up and then died away in the face of the universal sadness. . Heroes kept coming from the mine mouth throughout the night, lugging sacks that bulged with bodies. "An explosion as bad as yesterday's yester-day's may come any moment," Miller Mill-er Hay, state mine inspector, told the rescue squads. "Gas is so dense in the lower shafts where the rest of the bodies are buried that we'll have to be mighty careful." The spirit of the men was epitomized epito-mized by what Bill Duval, mine foreman, did. When he heard of the disaster he got up from bea where he was lying ill with influenza influ-enza and hurried to the shaft. "Count me in, men," he said grimly, as he donned a gas helmet. From 6 o'clock last night until daybreak he toiled with the others. His brother and a nephew were somewhere down below. Two of the five who lived through the explosion were near the mouth of the shaft and walked out unassisted. When tha first rescue crew went down, they were members. They said nothing and it was not until nightfall that it was learned they had been in the shaft. The other three survivors were found in an upper level. They were in a critical condition today, their 1 lungs seared by the choking gas. |