Buffalo, New York, USA
1889 - BUFFALO'S CALAMITY. The Heart of the City Swept by Fire, and a Loss of $2,500,000 Incurred -

Forty Buildings, Including Two Hotels Burned - A Fireman Killed by Falling Walls - Seventeen Other Persons Hurt.

BUFFALO, N. Y., Feb. 4 - The great fire Saturday morning did the most disastrous work in Buffalo since the embryo city was swept in flames in the war with the British and Indians in 1813 and only one house was left standing. A blaze in the heart of the manufacturing portion of the city was fanned by a high wind loaded with snow and destroyed more property than fire ever destroyed before in Buffalo. Flames were discovered about 2:45 o'clock in the upper portion of the new big five-story building of Root & Keating, the leather merchants, at the southwest corner of Wells and Carroll streets. Within an hour the great block was a mass of flaming ruins, and despite the efforts of the fire department other buildings in the vicinity caught from the flying fagots of fire. The Arlington Hotel and the Broezel House were soon in flames, but fortunately there was no loss of life, for the bright glow of the Root & Keating fire awakened the guests, who sought shelter elsewhere. The Sibley & Holmwood block at Seneca and Wells, the new iron building of Sherman S. Jewett & Company, the Root & Keating block and the Hoffeld building, and the hotels mentioned are among the principal buildings destroyed. Many other buildings were gutted by the flames, and before the fire was fully under control at 6 o'clock a good sized section of the Second ward had been gutted. Wells street, between Seneca and Exchange, was lined with wrecked buildings. And the fire penetrated easterly and westerly and leaped across Seneca street, damaging a dozen buildings and gutting two or three. Step by step the firemen were driven back from the center of the fire, and at 4:30 o'clock it seemed as though the flames had passed beyond the control of human beings. Indeed, all that prevented a quarter of Buffalo's business section from utter destruction were the heavy brick walls of the great Jewett iron block, of the Shepard Hardware Company's and the Hoffeld buildings.

Saturday morning shortly after 10 o'clock a portion of the walls of the Arlington Hotel fell in, burying four fire men. Three were quickly excavated, but the body of the fourth, that of Sandy Marion, was not recovered till late in the afternoon. An examination showed that he died of suffocation.

Seventeen firemen and onlookers received injuries during the progress of the fire from falling bricks, cornices, etc., and beams from the intense heat. About 1,000 people are thrown out of employment by the fire. As close an estimate of the losses as can be made now places the damage at $2,500,000. Forty buildings were burned. The principal losses are:

Strottman building at tenants, $500,000; Root & Keiting, $250,000; the Broezel House, $160,000; Sibley & Holmwood, $150,000; Fowler & Sons, $80,000; S. F. Eagan, liquor house, $40,000; the Arlington Hotel, $40,000; A. T. Kerr & Co., $30,000; A. Berl's sample room, $10,000; Lenard's hardware store, $50,000, T. W. Reynolds, boots and shoes, $220,000; Swift & Stamback, $150,000; A. Bertz, $10,000; Sidney Shepherd hardware, $40,000; Sibley & Holmwood, $125,000.

St Joseph Herald
Saint Joseph, Michigan
February 9, 1889

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