New York Chorus Girls Perish in Pathe Studio Fire Panic

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 956, 26 April 1930, Page 27

New York Chorus Girls Perish in Pathe Studio Fire Panic

HE Patlie Sound Studio HErTaTraS: at Park Avenue aud GSTF&O: One Hundred and Thirty-Fourth Street, New York City, was just getting work under way, one morning in December. On the floor of the studio electricians were fussing with lights, the orchestra was tuning up and some of the performers had already taken their places before the cameras. Upstairs chorus girls recruited from the musical comedies then playing on Broadway were getting into their costumes, for the scene was to be laid in a cabaret. Thus was the stage set for the first real tragedy of talkies —one of the most disastrous fires in studio history. A few minutes later a spark was discovered in the black velvet curtain which was used as a back drop to deaden the sound. Eager hands pulled it down aud then it was found that the whole space behind the curtain was a mass of flames. Precious minutes were wasted in attempting to fight the fire with such apparatus as was at hand, although an engine company's station was almost across the street, and a fire boat lay berthed alongside. By the time the alarm was turned in the fire was out of hand. HORRORS OF PANIC Panic ensued. The building is a low brick structure of two storeys and has windows fronting on two streets and an alley. None of those who made their way to windows and waited until rescued or jumped were seriously hurt. But the great majority of those employed in the studio strove to get away from the fire and through a narrow doorway set in the corner of the building. Their plight was aggravated by the outpouring of chorus girls and office employees on the mezzaine floor

above, some of whom had delayed leaving their rooms at the first alarm, either through desire to dress against the cold or to save their belongings, or possibly because they misinterpreted the alarm as a summons to come to work.

At any rate a furiously struggling, tangled mass of humanity fought for that precious three or four feet of space. There was a hideous jam over which smoke and flame swept. Two men and women never came out of that door alive-

The arrival of sufficient apparatus brought the fire under control in about an hour. But the damage had been done. Under blankets on the sidewalk or in ambulances on their

way to hospitals were 19 others. The total death list stood at ten, however. Among the victims were Edna Burford, Norine Byrne, Catherine Porter and Jola Sparks, members of the chorus of “The Little Show” and “Sons O’ Guns” died of trampling or flames.

Because of the circumstances which surrounded the tragedy and the scattering of those girls who got out safely, the studio did not know who had been lost, or where they lived, or the circumstances in which their families were left.

Officials started their desperately dii-.ult and emotionally trying tour at 6.30 that evening and the last check was not made until 1.30 next morning. They visited hospitals, rooming houses, family homes from the Bronx to Brooklyn. They were authorised by the Pathe Studio to make such immediate drafts as seemed necessary, but the studio arranged for the funerals and undertook to see that the families of the girls (or those which needed it) were subsidised.