Iroquois Theater Fire

[TheCommish]

Today is the 109 anniversary of this tragic fire; the fire that led to out swinging doors on assembly occupancies, exist signs and reportedly lead to the need for trained ushers now sometimes called crowed mangers in exiting from assembly occupancies.

In addition I have read before a theater in Chicago opens to the public, all the ushers go to their assigned exit; open the door and practice yelling "This way out!”

From How Regulation came to be: The Iroquois Theater Fire, by dsteffen Sun Feb 22, 2009 at 03:18 PM PST linked here Daily Kos: How Regulation came to be: The Iroquois Theater Fire

which is a great read

And I'll mention one more thing we owe to the tragedy of the Iroquois. A salesman from an Indianapolis hardware store named Carl Prinzler was supposed to be in the audience that day, but as sometimes happens, plans went awry and Prinzler missed the performance. Haunted by the horrific loss of life of which he, save for a twist of fate, might have been a part, Prinzler vowed to try to do something about it. Teaming up with an engineer neighbor, Henry DuPont, and with the support of Prinzler's employer, he set about to try to create a door mechanism that would prevent people from being trapped inside a burning building, even when a door was locked. Five years later, in 1908, the team perfected a style of door hardware known as the panic release bar, anti-panic device, or simply the panic bar. The hardware store where Prinzler worked had a manufacturing branch that produced the device and marketed it under the name Von Duprin -- a brand name that still exists today as a division of Ingersoll-Rand -- taking the name from the principals in the venture, "prin" from Carl Prinzler, "Du" from Henry DuPont, and "Von" from the owner of the hardware store, Clemens Vonnegut, great-grandfather of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., who spoke with obvious pride in several interviews of his family's contribution to fire safety.

I ma sure Lori will chime in on this story.

This tragedy and many others like it, motivates me and I hope many others in our code enforcement profession to stand fast when faced with the customer pushback to enforcement of what to them seems to be onerous regulation, or it will not happen here attitudes we face every day.

 

[TJacobs]

Every code enforcement official should be taught the history of large loss of life events so they'd have some background on why the job is so important.

 

[Francis Vineyard]

I've heard it said recently that codes are written in blood.

Francis

 

[Frank]

The Type 1 construction worked--the building was cleaned out, redecorated and reopened under a new name about a year later.

 

[DRP]

I appreciate your posting that and have reposted the link on "another" forum. Similar well written articles would be much appreciated as you all come across them.

 

[LGreene]

Thanks for sharing, Commish! The Iroquois Theater fire was one of the defining events in hardware history. It's even one of the answers in a crossword puzzle I just made for Doors & Hardware magazine. Imagine where life safety / egress would be today without panic hardware and outswinging doors.