An Arsonist's Fire in the Black Hawk Stable
A pre-dawn blaze in a Main Street livery kills four valuable horses and nearly takes the block — and the town is sure it was set on purpose.
About a quarter to 5 o'clock this Saturday morning, fire was discovered in one of the numerous small buildings in the rear of the Black Hawk livery stables, at the corner of Main and Stevens streets, owned by Warner & Roe. Fortunately there were a large number of people up at that hour, and in less than five minutes twenty or thirty were on the ground working to save the surrounding buildings. The fire was confined to a small shed about ten feet square, thanks to the hard work of those present. There were six valuable horses in the shed, four of which were burned to death, while two others are very seriously scorched, one of which may not recover. The building consumed was about a dozen feet from the main stable and joined it by a long barn containing a very large quantity of grain. It is very fortunate that all the conditions were favorable for fighting the fire, or there is no telling where the blaze would have stopped, as Main street is lined with frame buildings clear to the N. P. Hotel.
The fire was undoubtedly the work of an incendiary. Charles Finley was about the first person to discover the fire. He was hitching up a team preparing to go to the train when he observed smoke and a dull light over toward the Black Hawk stable. Not desiring to create a false alarm, he ran to the stable, and as he got there he saw a man run out with a blanket over his head. There were several tons of baled hay piled just inside of the door, and it was impossible to get out the confined animals. One of the horses, owned by Dr. Burch, was seen to run through the building with his mane and tail in flames. The poor brute reached the open air, but so frightfully burned that he was at once killed.
Many people visited the scene this morning, and crowds are gathered about the ruins as we go to press. The expression of the public was unmistakable, and had the perpetrator been caught he would have been summarily dealt with. The loss to buildings and hay can be covered by $200. The horses were valuable animals. Mr. Roe considers they were worth $500. One was owned by Dr. Burch, the balance by Warner Roe.
“The expression of the public was unmistakable, and had the perpetrator been caught he would have been summarily dealt with.”
In 1884 Spokane Falls was a tinderbox of frame buildings, and a single shed fire on Main Street could have taken the whole block — a reminder of how fragile the young city was. Today the same corner sits in the heart of downtown Spokane, where fire codes and masonry replaced the wooden frontier. The vigilante instinct voiced here ('summarily dealt with') shows how thin the line between order and mob justice was in a boomtown.
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