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56 stories matching smother
- Thirty-Seven Miners Died 150 Feet From Safety
An 1894 coroner's jury in Franklin, Washington, heard how a small fire in the Oregon Improvement Company's coal mine became a wall of smoke — and why the men who could have escaped stayed to fight it.
- A Jury Called the Franklin Mine Fire Arson. Thirty-Seven Miners Were Already Dead.
A coroner's jury found that someone deliberately set the fire that suffocated 37 workers in the Franklin mine. The only survivor described how one opened door and one stopped fan turned the gangway into a death trap.
- Heroic Teacher Critically Burned at Rainier School
A beloved educator sustained severe injuries while attempting to prevent a lamp fire during school closing exercises.
- Senate Smothers Temperance Measure in Heated Legislative Battle
A key liquor-control bill meets its end in Olympia, with temperance advocates denouncing the replacement legislation as a toothless farce.
- The Narrow Escape of Peter Oleson
A sewer trench collapse on Queen Anne leaves a laborer buried beneath two feet of earth while his coworkers frantically dig for his life.
- The Poor Man's Stump Burner: Newport Farmers Pack Kelly's Hall
In 1909, 150 farmers crowded a Newport hall to hear a state expert explain how to clear land by charring stumps—a low-cost method that promised to open Pend Oreille County fields.
- Late-Night Blaze Nearly Consumes Third Avenue Shop
A swift response by Seattle firefighters prevents a major conflagration at a secondhand goods store.
- The Franklin Mine Fire: Thirty-Seven Dead, Not a Scratch on Them
A fire in breast sixty-two traps miners between flame and return airway; bodies are laid in rows as Seattle sends a special train.
- A Mountain of Coffins: Franklin Buries Its Miners
After a mine fire killed 37 men, the coal town of Franklin held a day of funerals—five graves at Black Diamond, three Italian miners on a hillside, and widows whose grief doctors feared would kill them.
- A Seattle Utopia Sold in One-Cent Shares
A society of unemployed men pools its wages and plots a Bellamy-style commonwealth of railroads, coal mines and common tables — starting from $5 of capital and 500 one-cent shares.
- Thirty-Seven Miners Died Because They Stayed to Fight the Fire
A blaze in the Franklin coal mine sent smoke through the gangways on Aug. 24, 1894, killing 37 men and boys who thought they had time to escape.
- The Chehalis Inferno
A devastating blaze sweeps through four blocks of wooden buildings, leaving residents to wonder if firebugs are to blame for the city's second disaster in two months.
- The Sky Turned to Smoke: Forest Fires Choke Puget Sound
Fires across Whatcom, Skagit and the Olympic Mountains destroyed bridges, barns and a shingle mill, derailed a Great Northern train and left Puget Sound under a suffocating haze.
- The Brutal Assault at the Brunswick Hotel
A woman details a violent confrontation after refusing a bribe to perjure herself in a scandal involving a local man.
- The Shadow of the Gallows in Early Seattle
A crowded courtroom watches as a man is sentenced to hang for a murder on San Juan Island, marking a grim moment in the early administration of justice in Washington Territory.
- The Tragedy Beneath Lake Union
A routine sewer tunneling project turns into a deadly nightmare, leaving one laborer lost beneath six feet of quicksand as his comrades narrowly escape.
- The Franklin Mine Dead Were Buried. Then the Miners Went Back Down.
A relief fund swells with donations from Eddyville millmen and Seattle readers as surviving miners reopen the levels that did not burn.
- Smelter Boarding House Reduced to Ash After Brawl
A drunken dispute between boarders turned into an explosive inferno at the smelter district, leaving residents fleeing for their lives.
- The 1909 City Hall Power Grab That Tacoma Voters Were Told to Stop
A fiery Times editorial urged citizens to pack the council chamber against charter amendments it said would gut civil service, raise council pay, and hand city jobs to political loyalists.
- A Dispatcher's 'Lap Order' Sent Two Freight Trains Head-On Near Orting
A single mistake on a foggy single-track line killed engineer Louis U. Harmon and critically injured fireman Edward F. Martin—and left the dispatcher waiting helplessly for the crash.
- The Church Fair Scandal: When Seattle’s Clergy Played Prank on a Congregation
A reverend and his colleagues turned a charity fundraiser into an elaborate joke, dressing two women in 'shabbily' clothes to perform a 'Irish spectacle'—only for the punchline to backfire spectacularly.
- Tragedy on Pioneer Square: A Young Woman’s Brush with Death
While visitors from Victoria watched the fireworks display on Pioneer Square, a stray firecracker ignited a young woman's clothing, leading to a harrowing struggle for survival.
- The City's Water Problem: A Nuisance in the Making
After the Great Seattle Fire, one man's attempt to build a makeshift shelter leads to a messy public legal battle over fire hazards and sanitation.
- A Night of Terror on Seventh Street
A tragic lamp accident leaves a young woman severely burned and sparks a botched emergency response from the city's fire department.
- A Monitor, a Greased Pig, and a City on Fire for the Fourth
Seattle's 1895 Fourth of July committee promised a naval sham battle, fireworks over the water, yacht and canoe races, and two days of frontier sports.
Also about this, in other words
- Stopping the Smut Explosions
Innovation in threshing technology saved Washington farmers from fire and financial ruin.
- The Day the Smelter Blew: Peter Williams and the Seattle Explosion
A carpenter’s routine repair job ends in tragedy when a blowpipe explodes at Selhy’s Smelting Works, killing him instantly.
- The 'Crusher' Strikes Again
The steam collier San Pedro continues its destructive streak on Puget Sound.
- The Silent Killer in the Boarding House
An 1878 editorial warns Seattle residents that the city's obsession with airtight rooms and coal stoves is fueling a tuberculosis epidemic.
- A Scantling Scuffle at the Boom
A simmering dispute over local timber booms erupts in violence at Chenoise Creek.
- The 'Mashers' of the Shopping District
An editorial calls for public accountability for men who harass women in Tacoma's downtown streets.
- The Great Tacoma Smelter Scam
A smooth-talking promoter arrives in the dead of winter, promises a mining fortune, and leaves a town holding the bag.
- The Automatic Suitor-Smacker
A fed-up father builds a booby-trapped gate to drive away his daughters' persistent suitors, turning a domestic headache into a mechanical triumph.