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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you missed in history class from how

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Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcomes the podcast act

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Speaker 1: and I am probably frying. And today we have another

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Speaker 1: frequent listener requests, which is the Hartford Circus Fire. We've

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Speaker 1: gotten a lot of requests for it before, and then

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Speaker 1: every time we talk about a fire, it seems like

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Speaker 1: people ask for more fires. So we've gotten lots of

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Speaker 1: requests for this one. And there are actually lots of

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Speaker 1: books about the Hartford Circus Fire, and they don't agree

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Speaker 1: with each other in some pretty fundamental ways. They draw

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Speaker 1: really vastly different conclusions about everything from who started the fire,

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Speaker 1: if anyone deliberately started it, and the identity of the

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Speaker 1: most famous unidentified victim. There's just a lot of discrepancy

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Speaker 1: between them all. And I really didn't relish the idea

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Speaker 1: of reading through multiple books that were effectively quarreling with

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Speaker 1: each other about what happened. So I took a little

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Speaker 1: bit of a different tech when researching this article, and

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Speaker 1: that was that instead of reading lots of books, I

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Speaker 1: read historical newspapers that were published at the time of

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Speaker 1: this tragedy, and I followed the story as it happened.

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Speaker 1: So Most of the information in today's episode comes from

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Speaker 1: the New York Times and the Boston Globe, which was

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Speaker 1: then the daily Boston Globe as it was reported and

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Speaker 1: on the day. Uh and I didn't have access to

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Speaker 1: the archives of the Hartford Current, which would be the

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Speaker 1: logical paper to read because it was the local paper

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Speaker 1: to where this tragedy happened. Um, but I did read

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Speaker 1: some of their more recent coverage of retrospectives and updates

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Speaker 1: and things like that. So we're going to talk about

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Speaker 1: the Hartford Circus fire. So the Ringling Brothers and Barnamin

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Speaker 1: Bailey Circus, which we are just going to kind of

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Speaker 1: shorten to Ringling Brothers or Ringling for the sake of

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Speaker 1: simplicity as needed, so we're not whipping out a huge

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Speaker 1: phrase every time we have to reference. It was filled

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Speaker 1: with about eight thousand people in Hartford, Connecticut on July

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Speaker 1: and the big top at the circus was big, really big.

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Speaker 1: I mean the name the name was suitable for this one.

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Speaker 1: It was six hundred feet long and two ft wide,

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Speaker 1: so that's about twenty by sixty and it weighed twenty

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Speaker 1: tons while it had about eight thousand people in it

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Speaker 1: on this particular day, it could hold up to twelve thousand.

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Speaker 1: Because this was World War Two, most of the men

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Speaker 1: of Hartford were either away fighting or they were working

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Speaker 1: multiple shifts at nearby factories, so overwhelmingly the people in

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Speaker 1: the audience were children, mothers, and grandparents. The show started

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Speaker 1: at two in the afternoon. At a about two forty

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Speaker 1: a big cat show in the center ring had just

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Speaker 1: wrapped up. The famous Flying Wallenda's were starting their high

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Speaker 1: wire act up above, and people started to notice a

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Speaker 1: flame working its way up the side of the tent

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Speaker 1: near the men's restroom by the main entrance. The fire

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Speaker 1: spread extremely quickly. By the time a trio of ushers

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Speaker 1: got there with buckets of water, it was already too

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Speaker 1: big for them to put out. Almost simultaneously, people started

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Speaker 1: yelling fire and the band switched to playing Stars and stripes,

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Speaker 1: forever known in the business as the Disaster March and

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Speaker 1: used to signal that there is an emergency. People in

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Speaker 1: the top rows of the bleachers jumped down into the

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Speaker 1: straw that was below them and made for the exits,

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Speaker 1: or went out under the tent sidewalls. The people who

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Speaker 1: were up in the top of the bleachers overall fared

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Speaker 1: better than the people who were lowered down For that reason,

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Speaker 1: because the people who were closer to the floor got caught.

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Speaker 1: In the resulting stampede, parents and entertainers literally threw children

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Speaker 1: over animal cages that were blocking the exits. Some of

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Speaker 1: them cut their way out of the tent with pocket knives.

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Speaker 1: The wallendas, at risk of being trapped above the fire,

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Speaker 1: slid down ropes to the ground. The performers exit was

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Speaker 1: blocked by the crowd, so they headed for one of

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Speaker 1: the exits blocked by animal cages. Some climbed over, while

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Speaker 1: others tried to feed Some of the crowd through the

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Speaker 1: animal shoots that would lead out of the tent. Famous

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Speaker 1: clown Emmett Kelly, who was in his sad tramp clown

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Speaker 1: roll of Weary Willie, was actually part of the Willlenda's act.

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Speaker 1: While they did their work up in the top of

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Speaker 1: the tent, he would run around below them with a

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Speaker 1: little butterfly net. When he heard people screaming, he thought

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Speaker 1: that one of them Wilenda's, had fallen, and so he

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Speaker 1: looked out and saw that the tent was on fire.

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Speaker 1: He ran back to his dressing room to grab the

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Speaker 1: buckets that he would use to clean himself up after

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Speaker 1: the show was over, and he filled them with water

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Speaker 1: at a horse trough. Then he ran back in to

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Speaker 1: try to put the fire out. He threw the water

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Speaker 1: onto the burning tent, but it was far too late.

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Speaker 1: The fire was much too big to be put out

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Speaker 1: by a couple of buckets, so instead he tried he

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Speaker 1: started trying to evacuate children from the tent. The blaze

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Speaker 1: was very close to the main entrance, so he started

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Speaker 1: trying to guide people to a side exit that was

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Speaker 1: not on fire. Some of the kids were actually scared

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Speaker 1: of him. They were scared anyway, but then they were

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Speaker 1: scared because this clown was talking to him. But he

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Speaker 1: did get as many of the kids around him as

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Speaker 1: he could to safety, and then he saw that the

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Speaker 1: fire was getting close to a set of gas engines

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Speaker 1: that operated some of the circus equipment, so he refilled

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Speaker 1: his buckets and tried to soak the canvas near the

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Speaker 1: engines as much as possible, hopefully making them less likely

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Speaker 1: to catch fire. Then he escaped from the tent himself.

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Speaker 1: There are actually pictures of him at Kelly, still in

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Speaker 1: his makeup, carrying buckets that were taking the day of

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Speaker 1: the fire Uh, and that led to this event being

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Speaker 1: nicknamed the Day the Clowns Cried. Another heroic act by

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Speaker 1: one of the entertainers came from big cat trainer Make Covar.

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Speaker 1: She was at the center of the tent where her

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Speaker 1: animal act had just concluded. There was still a panther

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Speaker 1: in the metal cage that was part of the big

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Speaker 1: Cat show, and she knew that if she didn't get

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Speaker 1: both herself and the panther out and then secure all

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Speaker 1: the cages of the other big cats who were part

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Speaker 1: of the show, that they had the potential to break

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Speaker 1: loose in all of the k us and caused more

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Speaker 1: injuries and deaths, not surprisingly if you have ever spent

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Speaker 1: time around animals that are panicked. UH. This terrified panther

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Speaker 1: balked at going down the chute that led back to

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Speaker 1: its cages outside. It was just terrified, So Covar used

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Speaker 1: a whip which was really part of her costume and

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Speaker 1: not part of how she handled animals, to try to

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Speaker 1: hurt it into the chute, and once it was on

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Speaker 1: its way, she realized that she was trapped. The escaping

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Speaker 1: crowd had packed against the door leading out of the cage,

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Speaker 1: so she escaped by following the panther down the exit shoot,

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Speaker 1: and then she got the big cat's cage is secure

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Speaker 1: so that they could not escape into the crowd. The

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Speaker 1: big top collapsed behind her, and this had only been

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Speaker 1: about ten minutes since the fire started, and it burned

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Speaker 1: so hot that it literally melted the tent poles and

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Speaker 1: the animal cage that was at the middle of the

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Speaker 1: center ring. As the tent fell on fire, it trapped

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Speaker 1: a lot of people who were still inside trying to escape.

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Speaker 1: Although none of the circus employees were killed, possibly because

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Speaker 1: they knew they could get out of just about any

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Speaker 1: part of the tent by going under the sidewalls, many

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Speaker 1: were badly burned as they tried to get others to

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Speaker 1: safety and as they formed bucket brigades to try to

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Speaker 1: extinguish the fire. Since no animals were in the tent

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Speaker 1: and the fire didn't spread to the side show or

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Speaker 1: the menagerie, no animals were hurt or killed in the blaze.

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Speaker 1: A hundred and sixty eight people died. Half of them

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Speaker 1: were children, and a third of them were ages nine

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Speaker 1: and younger. Only a handful of those lost were adult men.

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Speaker 1: Four entire families died and the children of five other

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Speaker 1: families were orphaned. There were also six hundred and eighty

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Speaker 1: two injuries, and we're going to talk about sort of

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Speaker 1: the aftermath and how Hartford responded to this tragedy after

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Speaker 1: we take a little break, uh, and have a word

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Speaker 1: So to return to the city of Hartford, Army and

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Speaker 1: Navy forces were deployed to the scene of the fire,

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Speaker 1: along with three hundred ambulances and fifteen undred Red Cross volunteers.

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Speaker 1: Red Cross involvement with the victims of this disaster actually

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Speaker 1: went on for almost a year. State guardsmen were deployed

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Speaker 1: as well. A shipment of six blood plasma converters was

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Speaker 1: flown in from Boston, and the doctors who worked with

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Speaker 1: the burn patients credited this increased availability of plasma with

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Speaker 1: saving many lives. Morgue was set up at the Hartford

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Speaker 1: Armor and bodies were laid out in the hopes that

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Speaker 1: next of Kien would be able to identify their families,

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Speaker 1: but the fire burned so hot that some of the

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Speaker 1: bodies inside were essentially cremated already, and it melted some

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Speaker 1: of the steel girders that held up the tent. There

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Speaker 1: was a series of investigations. State Policy Commissioner Edward J. Hickey,

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Speaker 1: acting as State Fire Marshal, issued a report that blamed

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Speaker 1: not only the Ringling Brothers staff responsible for the tent,

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Speaker 1: but also the City of Hartford for not having inspected

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Speaker 1: the circus or the tent beforehand. Part of the report read,

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Speaker 1: no arrange mints were made or requested by any representative

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Speaker 1: of the circus for firemen or for firefighting equipment to

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Speaker 1: be in attendance upon the circus grounds during any performance.

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Speaker 1: The Hartford Fire Department did not detail any fireman or

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Speaker 1: assign any firefight firefighting apparatus to be in attendance at

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Speaker 1: the circus grounds during any of the performances. That's where

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Speaker 1: the quote ends. The only inspection of the circus that

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Speaker 1: the city had conducted was on the part of the

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Speaker 1: Building Supervisor's office, which had judged that the erection of

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Speaker 1: the tent, the bleachers, and the exits was satisfactor satisfactory,

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Speaker 1: which was the same as in previous years. So aside

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Speaker 1: from that, the big top itself was highly flammable. It

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Speaker 1: had been waterproofed using paraffin that was dissolved in gasoline,

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Speaker 1: and that was actually a pretty common method of waterproofing

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Speaker 1: materials at the time. When testifying in the investigation, then

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Speaker 1: Ringling president Robert Ringling claimed that he hadn't been able

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Speaker 1: to find a material that was both waterproof and fireproof

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Speaker 1: because the nation was at war, so resources were in

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Speaker 1: high demand and low availability. He also claimed that the

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Speaker 1: war had left the circus shorthanded, which is why there

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Speaker 1: were fewer firefighters on staff. Another report filed by Frank E.

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Speaker 1: Healy named seven employees of the circus responsible for the

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Speaker 1: fire James A. Haley Vice President, George W. Smith, General manager,

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Speaker 1: Leonard S. Aylesworth, Chief tentman, David W. Blanchefield, chief truckman,

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Speaker 1: Edward W. Bierstig, chief electrician, William Cayley, chief seatman, and

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Speaker 1: Samuel Clark seatman. The two seatmen were supposed to remain

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Speaker 1: under the bleachers during the show, and if they'd been there,

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Speaker 1: chances are one of them would have seen the fire

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Speaker 1: when it was much smaller and stomped it out, which

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Speaker 1: would have prevented the whole disaster. The Ringling Brothers Circus,

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Speaker 1: as a corporation, was also charged with involuntary manslaughter along

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Speaker 1: with all seven men. Although the charges against Clark were

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Speaker 1: eventually dropped, all seven of the men and the circus

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Speaker 1: pleaded no contest. Their defense counsel maintained that they were innocent,

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Speaker 1: but we're pleading no contest to avoid a lengthy trial.

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Speaker 1: He also claimed that they were all essential to the

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Speaker 1: circus resuming operations in order to try to get a

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Speaker 1: lighter sentence. It probably sounds callous that they were also

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Speaker 1: interested in returning to work, but one of the reasons

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Speaker 1: that they were so eager to resume circus operations is

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Speaker 1: that stopping the show was costing the circus about ten

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Speaker 1: thousand dollars a day, and possibly believing that doing so

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Speaker 1: would get them more leniency. The circus had agreed to

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Speaker 1: take full responsibility for the fire and to pay all

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Speaker 1: of the claims that were brought against it. Although the

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Speaker 1: circus was ensured, this insurance wasn't enough to pay off

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Speaker 1: all of the claims, which early estimates put out a

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Speaker 1: million dollars. It turned out to actually be a lot more.

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Speaker 1: So they weren't just saying we have to return to

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Speaker 1: work as a way to get out of it, like

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Speaker 1: they genuinely needed to return to work to make enough

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Speaker 1: money to be able to pay off these lawsuits. A

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Speaker 1: superior court judge permitted the circus to collect its property

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Speaker 1: in leave Town on July fourteenth, ninety four, and it

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Speaker 1: returned to its winter quarters in Sarasota, Florida, to regroup

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Speaker 1: and return to work so it could pay off its

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Speaker 1: remaining debts to the victims. Arbitration took six years. The

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Speaker 1: arbitration board awarded nearly four million dollars to five d

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Speaker 1: fifty one claimants. The average award was around seven thousand dollars,

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Speaker 1: although they ranged from a thousand dollars to a hundred thousand.

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Speaker 1: A professional dancer named Catherine R. Martin was burned over

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Speaker 1: fifty of her body and was hospitalized for six months,

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Speaker 1: and she received the largest settlement. Patricia Murray, he was

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Speaker 1: five at the time of fire, lost both of her

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Speaker 1: parents and her three year old brother, and she was

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Speaker 1: awarded ninety thousand dollars and as we talked about in

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Speaker 1: our episode on Katie Sandwina, this is often cited as

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Speaker 1: the first Chapter eleven bankruptcy case, but the official classification

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Speaker 1: of Chapter eleven didn't really come around until later, however,

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Speaker 1: the structure was quite similar. In what became known as

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Speaker 1: a heart for an arbitration agreement, the circus went into receivership,

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Speaker 1: promising to put all of its profits towards paying the

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Speaker 1: claims and not incur any unusual expenses until all of

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Speaker 1: that was paid off. And we didn't say in the

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Speaker 1: Katie sending An episode that it specifically was the Hertford

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Speaker 1: Circus fire that we were referencing, but it was, you

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Speaker 1: were curious. Hartford lawyer Edward Rogan was named as the receiver,

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Speaker 1: and he took over financial operations for the circus while

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Speaker 1: the circus continued to operate during the proceedings of the arbitration.

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Speaker 1: At this time, this was a completely new strategy for

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Speaker 1: a business that was dealing with extreme financial darress happens

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Speaker 1: a lot more often nowadays. That's really set the precedent

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Speaker 1: for it. The circus finally left receivership in July of

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Speaker 1: nineteen fifty four, when the court authorized payments to Rogan

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Speaker 1: and Julius B. Shots, who had served this as the

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Speaker 1: circus's council. Shots received a hundred thousand dollars and Rogan

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Speaker 1: received sixty thousand dollars, a fraction of his original two

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Speaker 1: hundred and twenty five thousand dollar request. A sort of

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Speaker 1: a side note, while overseeing the circus's financial affairs, Rogan

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Speaker 1: also reported that, in spite of the Hartford tragedy, the

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Speaker 1: nineteen forty four season was at that point the best

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Speaker 1: season in the Ringling Brothers circus history. Along with many

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Speaker 1: other governments, in the wake of this fire, the Connecticut

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Speaker 1: General Assembly later passed extremely strict fire safety measures for

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Speaker 1: tent circuses. Ringling Brothers and Barnamin Bailey didn't return to

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Speaker 1: the state for years, and they didn't return to Hartford

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Speaker 1: for decades. When the circus tried to arrange an appearance

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Speaker 1: in East Hartford in ninety four, the city refused. They

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Speaker 1: flatly said no, and so the circus did not return

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Speaker 1: to Hartford until the nineteen seventies. It's still not completely

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Speaker 1: clear what caused the fire. Initial results blamed a carelessly

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Speaker 1: tossed cigarette. Later theory was a short circuit in the

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Speaker 1: wiring in the men's room, and another theory is that

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Speaker 1: it was deliberately set. The city has a various points

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Speaker 1: reopened the case to re examine the evidence, and there

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Speaker 1: have also been people that have more re examined all

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Speaker 1: the evidence as a personal hobby. UH. In ninety in Ohio,

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Speaker 1: man named Robert D. SiGe Uh we're guessing on that

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Speaker 1: pronunciation because we could not find one online that was definitive,

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Speaker 1: claimed that he had set the fire deliberately, saying that

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Speaker 1: he was aroused about at the circus at the time.

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Speaker 1: He claimed that he had been told to do this

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Speaker 1: by a hallucination of quote a red Indian. And while

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Speaker 1: he had pleaded guilty to other arson charges in Circleville

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Speaker 1: in the Circleville, Ohio area, and served time for those offenses,

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Speaker 1: he was never actually charged in the Hartford Circus fire,

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Speaker 1: and in the end, investigators were generally doubtful that he

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Speaker 1: had actually been involved. There were a lot of inconsistencies

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Speaker 1: and holes in his statements, and some of his claims

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Speaker 1: regarding other crimes were kind of outlandish, and he did

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Speaker 1: later recant his confession. If you go poking around on

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Speaker 1: the internet, or if you have prebviously poked around on

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Speaker 1: the internet, you will find claims, some of them on

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Speaker 1: pretty reputable websites, that he served time in Ohio for

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Speaker 1: the Hartford Circus fire. The time he served in Ohio

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Speaker 1: was actually for other crimes that were committed in Ohio

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Speaker 1: and not for the Hartford Circus fire. And all of

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Speaker 1: this seems to come from a misunderstanding in a high

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Speaker 1: school student's paper, which perhaps the more recent writers who

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Speaker 1: have used it as a resource didn't realize it's by

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Speaker 1: a high school student. I'm not missing high school students.

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Speaker 1: This paper, overall I've read is extremely good. Um. And

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Speaker 1: the news coverage at the time of this guy in

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Speaker 1: his confession, a lot of it is worded very confusingly

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Speaker 1: because he is framed as the man who confessed to

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Speaker 1: the Hartford Circus fire. So it's sort of the man

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Speaker 1: who claimed who who confessed to the Hartford circus fire

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Speaker 1: serves time he was serving time for something else, right, Uh.

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Speaker 1: And there is also around this case a sort of

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Speaker 1: famous unidentified victim. There several actually, and we're going to

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Speaker 1: delve into their stories after we take a little break

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Speaker 1: and have a word from a sponsor. So today, there

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Speaker 1: is a memorial in Hartford, Connecticut, and the middle of

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Speaker 1: it is where the center pole of the Big Tops did.

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Speaker 1: Around the perimeter, there are several dogwood trees that note

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Speaker 1: where the perimeter of the tent would have been. There's

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Speaker 1: also a monument listing the names of the people who

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Speaker 1: died and several plaques that give a timeline of what

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Speaker 1: happened during the fire. There's also a memorial at Northwood

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Speaker 1: Cemetery for the victims of the fire who were not identifying.

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Speaker 1: Three unidentified children and three adults were buried there on

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Speaker 1: July tenth of nine, and an unidentified baby was cremated.

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Speaker 1: And I didn't put it in here, but the north

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Speaker 1: Wood Cemetery is not actually in Hartford proper. It's in

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Speaker 1: like a neighboring community. Only one of these six bodies

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Speaker 1: that were buried at Northwood Cemetery has ever been identified,

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Speaker 1: and this was an eight year old girl who died

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Speaker 1: in the fire and came to be known as little

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Speaker 1: Miss fifteen sixty five, after the number that she was

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Speaker 1: assigned at the morgue. She wasn't identified for years after

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Speaker 1: the fire. She had been trampled during the stampede as

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Speaker 1: people tried to escape. She died of her injuries about

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Speaker 1: three hours after being found, but since her face wasn't

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Speaker 1: very badly burned, they were hopeful that her family would

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Speaker 1: find her. Her features were really recognizable and her picture

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00:20:25,359 --> 00:20:29,000
Speaker 1: was published in the newspapers. Her story really caught the

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Speaker 1: hearts of a lot of people who were following the

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00:20:31,440 --> 00:20:36,840
Speaker 1: tragedy as it unfolded, especially as the attention kept returning

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Speaker 1: to her case to try to identify who she was,

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00:20:39,880 --> 00:20:42,840
Speaker 1: and police theorized that her family must have been new

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Speaker 1: to the area and that her parents must have been

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Speaker 1: killed in the fire, or perhaps some other family had

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00:20:49,080 --> 00:20:52,679
Speaker 1: mistaken a different badly burned body as their own child,

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Speaker 1: leaving little Miss fifteen sixty five behind. The search for

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Speaker 1: little Miss fifteen sixty five family went on for months.

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00:21:01,280 --> 00:21:04,359
Speaker 1: Her picture was in papers in Hartford, Boston, New York,

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Speaker 1: and other Northeastern cities. There were calls that came in

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Speaker 1: from all over New England from people who claimed that

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00:21:10,080 --> 00:21:12,440
Speaker 1: she was their relative, but they didn't pan out. The

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00:21:12,640 --> 00:21:15,120
Speaker 1: various things didn't match up. I think they were using

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00:21:15,200 --> 00:21:19,280
Speaker 1: dental records, and dental records didn't match. For decades, Hartford

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00:21:19,320 --> 00:21:22,199
Speaker 1: police brought flowers to the grave at Christmas and on

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Speaker 1: the anniversary of the fire, and the coverage of that

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00:21:24,800 --> 00:21:27,560
Speaker 1: tradition would start this cycle of letters and calls about

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Speaker 1: little Miss fifteen sixty five all over again. In so

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00:21:33,640 --> 00:21:37,960
Speaker 1: almost fifty years after the fire, Hartford Fire Lieutenant Rick

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00:21:38,080 --> 00:21:41,840
Speaker 1: Davy identified little Miss fifteen sixty five as Eleanor Cook.

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00:21:42,240 --> 00:21:46,000
Speaker 1: He interviewed surviving family members of various filmings and the

400
00:21:46,040 --> 00:21:48,960
Speaker 1: hope of finding out who this little girl was. He

401
00:21:49,119 --> 00:21:53,960
Speaker 1: also did a lengthy reinvestigation of the fire itself. Eleanor's

402
00:21:54,040 --> 00:21:56,879
Speaker 1: surviving brother, Donald, who was nine at the time of

403
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Speaker 1: the fire and was there but escaped, confirmed identification, and

404
00:22:02,240 --> 00:22:05,000
Speaker 1: the reason that she hadn't been identified at the time

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Speaker 1: of the event was that her mother, Mildred Cook, had

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00:22:07,600 --> 00:22:09,560
Speaker 1: been so badly burned in the fire that she was

407
00:22:09,680 --> 00:22:14,440
Speaker 1: unconscious for weeks and she ended up hospitalized for six months.

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Speaker 1: Her son, Edward, was six and he had also died

409
00:22:17,040 --> 00:22:20,160
Speaker 1: in the fire, and once Mildred was well enough to leave,

410
00:22:20,200 --> 00:22:23,360
Speaker 1: she was too traumatized to look for her daughter's body.

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00:22:24,040 --> 00:22:27,560
Speaker 1: An amended death certificate was issued for Eleanor on March eight,

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Speaker 1: and her remains were reinterred next to her deceased brother,

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00:22:33,280 --> 00:22:37,560
Speaker 1: where the gravestone had previously marked an empty grave. However,

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00:22:38,119 --> 00:22:41,679
Speaker 1: there are still people who actually questioned this identification, in

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00:22:41,760 --> 00:22:44,280
Speaker 1: part because other members of the family had said little

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Speaker 1: Miss fifteen sixty five was not Eleanor at the time

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00:22:47,040 --> 00:22:50,440
Speaker 1: of the fire. In fact, this had made Donald reluctant

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Speaker 1: to ask about it. He worried that he would upset

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00:22:52,840 --> 00:22:56,240
Speaker 1: his mother or his aunt who had made the initial identification.

420
00:22:57,840 --> 00:23:02,119
Speaker 1: And a weird recent twist up on his retirement, Hartford

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00:23:02,160 --> 00:23:05,679
Speaker 1: fire Captain William Pond destroyed the photos of her that

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00:23:05,720 --> 00:23:08,320
Speaker 1: had hung in the firehouse of Engine Company fourteen for

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00:23:08,359 --> 00:23:11,119
Speaker 1: more than twenty five years, saying he was afraid that

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Speaker 1: her soul would never find rest otherwise. Uh. Following letters

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00:23:16,000 --> 00:23:20,840
Speaker 1: to the editor after this are kind of divided about

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00:23:20,840 --> 00:23:25,800
Speaker 1: whether that was the right thing to do or not. Yeah,

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00:23:25,840 --> 00:23:28,600
Speaker 1: I mean I I would have questions of like, was

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00:23:28,640 --> 00:23:31,160
Speaker 1: this something that a decision that he made solely on

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00:23:31,240 --> 00:23:35,960
Speaker 1: his own or were other people involved. He seems to

430
00:23:36,080 --> 00:23:40,720
Speaker 1: have been trying to get other uh fire department leadership

431
00:23:40,800 --> 00:23:43,600
Speaker 1: to to take it down for a long time and

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Speaker 1: and was shut down every time he asked about it,

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Speaker 1: And so he did it himself as he was retiring,

434
00:23:49,960 --> 00:23:53,639
Speaker 1: figuring he was untouchable at that point. Bye, that that

435
00:23:53,720 --> 00:23:56,480
Speaker 1: seems to be That is what I would read into it. Yes,

436
00:23:56,600 --> 00:23:59,480
Speaker 1: huh so, Yeah, it's sort of an odd coda to

437
00:23:59,600 --> 00:24:03,320
Speaker 1: that whole story. There are definitely, yeah, there are definitely

438
00:24:03,400 --> 00:24:08,159
Speaker 1: some unanswered questions that will probably remain forever about the

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00:24:08,160 --> 00:24:11,320
Speaker 1: fire and exactly what happened. But it was definitely a tragedy.

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00:24:11,359 --> 00:24:15,840
Speaker 1: It definitely led to some much more stringent rules, especially

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00:24:15,880 --> 00:24:21,320
Speaker 1: about ten circuses in particular all over the United States,

442
00:24:21,320 --> 00:24:25,080
Speaker 1: not just in Connecticut. In Peppier News, do you have

443
00:24:25,200 --> 00:24:29,560
Speaker 1: a spot of listener mail. It's the correction about our

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00:24:29,560 --> 00:24:33,160
Speaker 1: episode on the Catalpa and the Fremantle Six. And this

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00:24:33,200 --> 00:24:35,879
Speaker 1: is from Louise and Louisa's. I recently discovered your podcast

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00:24:36,000 --> 00:24:38,240
Speaker 1: and I'm really loving it, so well done. I was

447
00:24:38,280 --> 00:24:40,800
Speaker 1: listening to your episode about the Catalpa and the Fremantle

448
00:24:40,840 --> 00:24:43,359
Speaker 1: Six today and I wanted to correct something. I'm from Perth,

449
00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:46,439
Speaker 1: Western Australia, and you said that the Fremantle six was

450
00:24:46,480 --> 00:24:49,600
Speaker 1: the only successful prison break from Fremantle Prison. This is

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00:24:49,640 --> 00:24:52,720
Speaker 1: not actually true. In the eighteen hundreds, there was a

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00:24:52,720 --> 00:24:58,000
Speaker 1: bush ranger called Joseph Bolthio John's known more commonly as

453
00:24:58,440 --> 00:25:02,159
Speaker 1: Moondine Joe. He was notorious for escaping and roaming the

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00:25:02,160 --> 00:25:05,440
Speaker 1: countryside so much that Free Mental Prison built a customs

455
00:25:05,680 --> 00:25:09,840
Speaker 1: cell specifically designed to keep moon Dine in he escaped.

456
00:25:10,320 --> 00:25:12,840
Speaker 1: You can still visit the cell today. Here's a link

457
00:25:12,880 --> 00:25:15,320
Speaker 1: to more about him. Uh. And then she says she

458
00:25:15,359 --> 00:25:18,000
Speaker 1: really loved the episode about Katie sanduina. I hope I'm

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00:25:18,040 --> 00:25:21,840
Speaker 1: saying moon Dine correctly. Uh. So I wrote back and

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00:25:21,880 --> 00:25:25,280
Speaker 1: I said, wow, I wonder which of my sources got

461
00:25:25,320 --> 00:25:28,800
Speaker 1: that completely wrong. Uh. Some of that was based on

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00:25:28,840 --> 00:25:30,320
Speaker 1: books that have had to go back to the library

463
00:25:30,359 --> 00:25:33,960
Speaker 1: since then, but it was wrong. I have learned since

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00:25:34,000 --> 00:25:36,439
Speaker 1: then that not only did this guy escape and the

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00:25:36,440 --> 00:25:40,280
Speaker 1: Freemantle six escape, there's a whole page about jail breaks

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00:25:40,800 --> 00:25:47,040
Speaker 1: at the Freemantle prison and it was a tradition. It

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00:25:47,200 --> 00:25:50,240
Speaker 1: turns out that there that will while they were relying

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00:25:50,520 --> 00:25:55,119
Speaker 1: on the uh the overwhelmingly forbidding territory around the prison

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00:25:55,160 --> 00:25:57,720
Speaker 1: to keep people inside, there were other people who broke out.

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00:25:58,040 --> 00:26:00,680
Speaker 1: So we messed that up. Uh And now we know.

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00:26:00,960 --> 00:26:04,320
Speaker 1: So thank you Louise for writing to let us know

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00:26:04,440 --> 00:26:09,639
Speaker 1: that that was definitely not correct. If you would like

473
00:26:09,680 --> 00:26:11,880
Speaker 1: to write to us about this or any other podcast,

474
00:26:12,160 --> 00:26:14,960
Speaker 1: you can for a history podcast at houst Works dot com.

475
00:26:15,320 --> 00:26:17,960
Speaker 1: We're also on Facebook at facebook dot com, slash miss

476
00:26:17,960 --> 00:26:20,360
Speaker 1: in History and on Twitter at miss in History. Our

477
00:26:20,480 --> 00:26:22,920
Speaker 1: tumbler is missing history dot tumbler dot com, and we're

478
00:26:22,960 --> 00:26:25,399
Speaker 1: on Pinterest at pentriest dot com slash miss in History.

479
00:26:26,640 --> 00:26:29,560
Speaker 1: We have a spreadshirt store full of shirts and whatnot.

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00:26:30,000 --> 00:26:32,400
Speaker 1: You can look that up at miss in history dot

481
00:26:32,400 --> 00:26:35,399
Speaker 1: spreadshort dot com. If you would like to learn more

482
00:26:35,480 --> 00:26:37,960
Speaker 1: about what we talked about today kind of a different angle,

483
00:26:38,520 --> 00:26:40,639
Speaker 1: you can come to our parent company's website. Put the

484
00:26:40,640 --> 00:26:43,200
Speaker 1: word confession in the search bar and you will find

485
00:26:43,200 --> 00:26:46,400
Speaker 1: the article why would a person make a false confession

486
00:26:46,440 --> 00:26:49,719
Speaker 1: to a crime? Uh. You can also come to our

487
00:26:49,760 --> 00:26:52,440
Speaker 1: website and find an archive of all of our episodes

488
00:26:52,480 --> 00:26:54,320
Speaker 1: ever show notes for the ones Holly and I have

489
00:26:54,359 --> 00:26:56,280
Speaker 1: worked on other cool stuff. You can do all of

490
00:26:56,280 --> 00:26:58,040
Speaker 1: that at how stuff works dot com or miss and

491
00:26:58,119 --> 00:27:16,000
Speaker 1: history dot com. For more on this and thousands of

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00:27:16,000 --> 00:27:19,240
Speaker 1: other topics, visit how stuff works dot com