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Show , i u . rianes Finally Controlled; ; rAttcr Fl2bt Extending Orer Five Hours; Dam-Hare Dam-Hare Will Run Between; $225,000 and $300,000 For a Time the Spreading: Blaze Threatened to 7 : Burn : Business Block r From. Main to West : Temple Streets, . 4 "Tire which started in the Atlas block &bout 2 o'clock thla morning raged for . five hours before placed under control, and for three hour threatened to make clean sweep of the north side of West Second South street from Main to West Temple. ,The total loss Is conservatively estimated esti-mated at from $225,000 to $250,000, the -Atia block being totally destroyed, Wltlr every vestige of Its contents, except ex-cept such, as was protected, by fireproof fire-proof saf'ts, being utterly consumed by he fierce 'flames. . Central Block Damaged. V The . eastern portion of the . Central Hock, separated from the Atlas block only by a narrow driveway, was heavily heav-ily damaged, falling walls, smoke, flame and water all contributing to the work of destruction. ' Half a hundred tenants of the AUas block lost everything. The flames spread with almost . Incredible rapidity, and even for those who were sleeping In their apartments there was no time to. escape with 'more than, such wearing apparel as could be snatched up wlth-ut wlth-ut an Instant's delay. -fFrirte,XiOMM Heavy. . : V 11 Nearly all the tenants of the doomed. building were professional men and . mining operators. Attorneys and phy-F'oirs phy-F'oirs t'"- . 1i themajority. Upon t..tae the logs f.-s with unusual sever- ity.' 'Valuable . libraries of legal: nd medical works and scdres of costly surgical" sur-gical" instruments were" consumed, as well as many valuable legal papers. " Many of these men carried no insurance. insur-ance. Those who were protected in part will recover probably 30 per cent of their loss. ... 1 For more than two hours after the flames gained headway and before the firemen felt that their sweep was under" control It seemed certain that the entire en-tire north side of the street from West. Temple to Main must be destroyed. A heavyiwtnd rose, blowing first toward the east, then toward the west, rire in the Breeze. J- Pieces of burning wood were carried half a block, falling upon the Ken yon hotel and all the intervening buildings en the east and threatening the Federation Federa-tion of Labor balls on West Temple. i-At times' as the wind veered a fierce gust drove. flames south across Second South, street and literally covering the Cullen hotel and adjoining structures I with glowing coals. The guests in the J Cullen were aroused and Instructed to . be ready to leave in case of danger. No other large fire of recent years has . been in the very heart of the city and has' threatened, the destruction of so much valuable property. Had the progress of the flames not ""been checked before the burning of the i Central block was imperative, all the J buildings west of that structure to J West Temple would have been con- - eumed. as they are of wood that would have burned like tinder, and there are ik intervening passageways to afford a . vantage ground for combat. 2rogTes Toward Main Street. r.Had the D. F. Walker building Imme-' Imme-' filately east of 'the burned Atlas block taken fire nothing could have checked the . progress of the fire until Main street on the east had interposed a natural nat-ural barrier.' In either case the loss must have exceeded $1,000,000, end to it would probably have been added the sacrifice of many lives. Removed Their Effects. Occupants of the threatened 'build- ings apprehended their danger. Money, Jewels, stock certificates and other valuable val-uable papers, law libraries and other easily movable personal property, were ' quickly carried to places of comparative compara-tive safety. As a result, the law offices In the D. F. Walker building this morning appeared ap-peared as if swept by a Kansas cyclone. Thousands of volumes of legal works had 'been carried to the east windows and thrown -on the roof of the lower building adjoining, from where they would have been removed had the D. F. Walker block taken fire. All day the attorneys have been engaged In carrying carry-ing back their libraries and endeavoring endeavor-ing to bring order out of the chaos that followed the night of terror.' Bulck Work of Flames. 7 Mysterious indeed and almost beyond jtomprehenslon was the rapidity with l which the fire ate ita way into every corner of the Atlas block. Within r Jwenty minutes following the discovery of the blaie, which at the time of turn- ContInued on page t. able to reach the roof with water. "They moved like snails," he declared, de-clared, "and showed no proper appreciation appre-ciation of the situation. Had it not been for the efforts of others and a fortunate for-tunate change in the wind the Street would have been swept clear to Main." When at last there was nothing left in the Atlas block that the flames could feed upon and their spread to the east and west hd been checked, the scene ytvas one of desolation. In the Burned Block. Of the interior of the Atlas block there is absolutely nothing left; not a vestige of the many handsome suites of offices remains. Portions of the outer walls are standing; within there is only the great chimjiey, surrounded by hundreds hun-dreds of tons of broken red and white-hot white-hot bricks and a mass of twisted Iron and steel girders. Far beneath this debris are buried the safes that were scattered through the building, some of the smaller of which it is thought will not be able to withstand the Intense he.tt without damage to their contents . Battle of Four Hours. The four hours' battle with tfie fire, for it was nearly 6 o'clock before it was clear that the Central blor-k and the D. F. Walker building would not share the fate of the Atlas, gave ri.se to many Instances of heroism and disregard of personal safety, When th flames reached the Salt Lake Hardware com-pany'sstore com-pany'sstore In the Central block, where a large quantity of powder ar.d ammunition ammu-nition is stored, cartridges bepsn to explode ex-plode until the reports came like skirmish skir-mish firing. Yet, in the face Of this apparent ap-parent danger, the explosives were carried car-ried from the buHding and the firemen continued to contest the spread of the flames. In order to protect the lives 'of the firemen who were at work in the D. F. Walker building from live wires, the electric light current was cut off from the building, and when a number of houses opened for business at 7 o'clock tallow candles were in strong demand. The water pressure at the time the alarm was turned in was 110 pounds. FIGHT FIRE FIVE HOURS (Continued from Page 1.) ing In the alarm did not appear formidable, for-midable, the entire interior of the building build-ing seemed a surging sea of flames. They burst through the windows on every floor; the elevator shaft and the stairways formed chimneys that augmented aug-mented the draught upward, and before the Are department had rallied to the battle the roof was pierced by spears and lances of Aame that quickly expanded ex-panded with fiery sheets and lit the streets and lowering storm clouds with a glare that made the street lights pale. The Roof Falls. ' In a short time the roof fell; an unimpeded un-impeded outlet was afforded, and the blaze leaped fifty feet above the topmost top-most walls, while flaming embers and glowing coals fell in showers for rods around. Low Pressure Claimed.' '. V . By this time, three-quarters of an hour after the discovery of the Are, the firemen got a line of hose to the top of the Central block, but the pressure was low. The high walls of the burning structure seemed ' an insurmountable obstacle, and it became apparent that to prevent the spread of the flames to, nearby buildings was all that could be done. - The Aoors began to drop, the fourth, third and Becond falling at short intervals, inter-vals, each with a crash like cannonading, cannonad-ing, as immense iron safes crashed downward. Mingled with this roar like the rattle of musketry were sharp reports re-ports from exploding grenades and fire extinguishers in the various offices. Walls Begin to Fall. After the fire had raged for two Sours the walls began to fall. First the rear wall swayed for a minute in the wind then went down with a crash, blocking the rear alley with debris and caving In the roof of the Salt Lake Hardware company's warehouse. Then a portion of the east wall followed, fol-lowed, damaging some of the low extensions ex-tensions in the rear of the D. F. Walker building. A portion of the front wall went outward into the street, jeopardizing jeopardiz-ing the lives of the firemen, several of whom narrowly escaped death from the flying bricks and stones. Some of the west wall crashed into the roof of the Central block, driving back the firemen who were using this as a position from which to fight .the fire, and carrying the flames over into that structure. ' The Big Explosion. While the flames were raging most fiercely, amid the minor explosions, came one" of unusual violence , that hurled half a brick across the wide street and through a .window on the fifth floor of the Cullen hotel. A traveling trav-eling man who occupied the room nar-rawly nar-rawly escaped death from being struck by the missile. ' Tenants of the Atlas block and others who watched the progress of the fire are very generally criticising the fire department for a failure to work as if appreciating the gravity of the situation. situa-tion. Criticise the Firemen. I Joseph Arnold, a hackman,-who discovered dis-covered the blaze at 6 minutes before 2 o'clock, and requested a patrolman to turn in an alarm, says that after this Was done he ate a hearty supper In a restaurant and drove a nille and a half with a fare before the Fire Chief arrived ar-rived on the scene or a single line of hose was playing upon the building. "I am certain that it was at least three-querters of an hour after the alarm was sent in before the department depart-ment got to work." said Arnold today. Others declared thl3 morning that the firemen moved about at their duties as if there were no occasion for haste and seemed to make no earnest efforts to do more than protect the Central block and the D. F. Walker building. Had a Private Fire Hose. One tenant of the D. F. Walker block said that the only thing that saved it from certain destruction was the fact that Agent Raybould, who has charge of the Walker building, got on the roof with his own fire hose within tea minutes min-utes after the blaze was discovered and nearly an hour before the firemen were |