We have no idea what started it and sent the factory up in flames. In some ways, this fire remains a mystery even today. And more probably would have died if not for a brave young Black man named Oliver Davis, who dashed inside and pulled multiple people from the inferno-including the factory’s owner. Worst of all, ten people really did die horribly inside, including several young women burned alive. People really did get trapped behind barred windows, and several people really did try to smash the bars open with sledgehammers. But it’s all based on real details, from a fire in a factory in Brooklyn in 1909. Now, that scene I just described was partly invented. Every last person trapped inside seems doomed to die. From the looks of it, none of the other men succeeded in knocking open the other windows. There’s nothing to do but climb down, hacking and coughing. You can no longer see the women at the window. But when you’re steady again, the screams have stopped. ![]() You manage to catch yourself before falling. The draft is so strong you drop the sledgehammer it clatters below. ![]() But the women are still screaming-until a whoosh of flame erupts behind them. You can hardly breathe anyway, and you’re getting lightheaded. The iron is too thick, bolted to the brick façade. You rain blow after blow on the iron bars. There’s also toxic smoke billowing in your face. You promise to free them.īut it’s hard to get a good swing on a ladder. Their hands are bloody from where they’ve broken the glass. Their eyes are wide, and they’re screaming. Other men do the same at other windows.Īt the window, you come face to face with two women-a short redhead, and a tall brunette. And while someone holds a ladder at the bottom, you scamper up toward one of the barred windows. Another person rushes up with sledgehammers. ![]() Luckily, people start arriving with ladders from another, nearby factory. They’re screaming and shaking the bars, like rabid apes in a cage. But right now, those safety bars have trapped people inside. In fact, every window at the factory has bars, to keep burglars out. Then you realize that they’re trapped behind bars. ![]() You look up, and see people at the windows on the third floor. You see a young Black man hauling a limp, burned body out the door. You rush up, and sure enough, the factory is engulfed in flames-from basement to roof. People have been calling that factory a deathtrap for years. You start running, but you know immediately where it’s coming from. You look up, and above the roofline, you can already see smoke-thick brown clouds. You’re walking along through an Italian neighborhood, munching on an apple for breakfast. Imagine it’s 1909 in Brooklyn, New York, about 9:00 a.m. This led to notable tragedies in movie theaters, as well as in hospitals that used nitrocellulose X-rays such as the Cleveland Clinic Hospital, where 122 people died in a fire in 1929. The only fatal flaw with this plastic is that it’s also extremely combustible-so much so that it can burn underwater once it gets going. With nitrocellulose film, you could run reels of pictures together quickly, which gave birth to the first movies. This thick, transparent liquid was the world’s first plastic and could be shaped into anything, including billiard balls and photography film. In this episode of The Disappearing Spoon, Sam Kean breaks down the history of nitrocellulose.
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