Monday, March 22, 2010

The Fire Could Have Been Prevented

There was a big fire in Hackettstown on Halloween night, 1899.

Hackettstown Historian Dan LeMasters told me today that the Centenary College Fire (Halloween 1899) was caused in the boiler room by loose rags lying around in the long place.
The Denis Sullivan book about Tillie Smith said that James Titus was a very conscientious janitor. When It his duties are listed, the first one was tending the furnace.

He would have been manager of the Maintenance Department by 1899. If he had not been sent to jail for a murder he did not commit, there would have been no fire. Hackettstown would be a totally different place.

What do you think?

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