1917 — June 8, Granite Mountain Speculator Copper Mine Shaft Fire, Butte, MT –161-168

— 168 Parrett. “The Granite Mountain – Speculator Mine Disaster.” Big Sky Journal, summer 2017.
–155 in the mine
— 13 from injuries after reaching the surface
— 168 The Granite Mountain Speculator Mine Butte, MT Memorial. “The Story of the Memorial.”
— 168 Wikipedia. “Speculator Mine disaster.” 11-7-2022 edit. (No source citation for death toll.)
–>167 Harrington. A Reexamination of the Granite Mountain-Speculator Fire. MT Hist. Soc.
— 163 Cole. History of MSHA, slide 26.
— 163 Mine Safety and Health Administration, DOL. Historical Data for Mine Disasters. 2008
— 163 National Fire Protection Association. Key Dates in Fire History. 1996.
— 163 NFPA. U.S. Unintentional Fire Death Rates by State. December 2008, p. 22.
— 163 Searl, Molly. Montana Disasters: Fires, Floods, and Other Catastrophes. 2001, p. 51.
— 161 Fay. Metal-Mine Accidents in the United States During the Calendar Year 1917. 1919.
— 161 Safety Engineering, Vol. XXXVIII (38), No. 6, December, 1919, p. 363.
— 156 Chicago Daily News Almanac & Yearbook 1919, “Great Mining Disasters…, p. 169.

Blanchard note on death toll: We are of the opinion that the most credible number of fatalities is 168, given three sources and the breakout of the 168 fatalities by Parrett. None-the-less, the only estimate we think we can safely eliminate is the Chicago Daily News Almanac and Yearbook number of 156. We do not think that the sources which note 161, 163, or over 167 deaths (meaning at least 168) should be dismissed as not credible.

Narrative Information

Harrington: “Although not the worst mining disaster, the Granite Mountain-Speculator Mine fire on June 8, 1917, was the nation’s worst hard-rock mining disaster, with at least 167 fatalities….

“The history of mine fatalities, labor militancy, and mineral production all reached a peak in Butte at the time of the Speculator disaster. The fire occurred during World War I when war production was at its peak. Indeed, the 15,000 people employed in Butte’s mines were setting production records, supplying approximately 20 percent of the nation’s copper and one-half of the quality zinc needed by the military. Massive production and a huge work force notwithstanding, the Butte underground was one of the world’s most deadly work places. Throughout the war–from August 1914 to mid-November 1918–pressure to get the “rock in the box” cost some 437 men their lives in accidents in Butte’s mines. As noted, at least 167 of these were lost in the Granite Mountain-Speculator fire alone.

“Ironically, an attempt to install a fire suppression system in the Granite Mountain and Speculator mines caused the fire itself. At 11:30 p.m. on June 8, several men were lowering electrical cable into the shaft of the North Butte Mining Company’s Granite Mountain Mine. The line, intended to power a fire sprinkler system, slipped, tearing the lead coating from the wire and exposing fiber insulation. While attempting to retrieve the line, the flame from assistant foreman Ernest Sullau’s carbide lamp came in contact with the insulation, which quickly burst into flames. As chemically treated mine timbers in the shaft soon ignited, smoke and gas from the fire spread rapidly throughout the Granite Mountain Mine and, through interconnecting underground workings, to the Speculator, Badger State, Bell-Diamond, and other mines in the immediate area.

“Prior to the Granite Mountain incident, a fire had been burning for two months in nearby Modoc Mine. On two occasions, smoke alerts had sent men scurrying for the Granite Mountain shaft, a downcast shaft that brought fresh air into the mines from the surface, to escape the smoke. Many miners apparently assumed that the June 8 fire was a recurrence of the Modoc troubles and committed the fatal error of moving toward the source of the fire. Because of the previous fire, concrete bulkheads had been constructed in the High Ore Mine to limit smoke and gas to the Modoc Mine area. Pro-labor advocates later claimed that these bulkheads blocked escape routes in violation of state law and caused additional deaths. Although Daniel Harrington, an inspector for the Bureau of Mines who also coordinated the rescue attempts, stated in his initial federal report that only one body was found near a concrete bulkhead, the accusation contributed to subsequent labor discontent.

“Coincidental to my research was that of Gerry Walter, who was given the responsibility of developing the long postponed memorial at the Granite Mountain Mine site. In Butte, the disaster is referred to as the Speculator fire. The North Butte Mining Company’s memorial at Butte’s Mountain View Cemetery refers to it as the Granite Mountain fire. Other sources use names at their discretion. Thus, because the names the Speculator (or Spec) fire and Granite Mountain fire were used interchangeably for the June 8, 1917, event, Ms. Walter and I, after consulting with others, hyphenated the name of the disaster as the Granite Mountain-Speculator fire. In researching the names of those killed, Ms. Walter, not wanting to exclude anyone from the memorial plaque, listed 168 names.

“Although my research had shown that at least 167 men were killed, I knew that additional fatalities were possible because the total varied in press and official reports at the time. The names and numbers of those killed changed daily even within the same newspaper. On June 15, 1917, for example, a week after the disaster, the Butte Miner reported that 161 bodies had been brought to the surface and that seven bodies had yet to be recovered. Two days later the paper noted that 10 bodies remained in the mine. Five more bodies were removed on June 22, three of which were eventually identified. The following day, another body was removed and identified, which, under ordinary circumstances, would indicate that 167 bodies had been removed and that others probably remained in the mine. A handwritten note on the list of unidentified dead in Silver Bow County’s coroner’s register indicated that an additional body (not included in my determination) was found in the Speculator Mine the following year.

“Most historical reports list the number of fatalities at 163, the number used by the mining company in the Montana Industrial Accident Board’s report….

“Researching the fire is difficult because the coroner’s inquest record number 8193, which included testimony from more than 60 individuals, is missing from the Butte-Silver Bow Clerk of the Court’s office. The Silver Bow County coroner’s inquest concluded at the end of June that 98 identified and 66 unidentified bodies were recovered for a total of 164. Some discrepancies exist in the names in the county’s inquest index and the coroner’s register. In the Clerk and Recorder office records there are references to 169 fatalities. The coroner issued death certificates for 95 identified and 74 unidentified bodies. The mortuary record at the Butte-Silver Bow Public Archives lists the same number of unidentified bodies but also lists 97 as being identified. Neither the Clerk and Recorder records nor mortuary records contain a compiled list of names.

“All sources examined differ in names, spellings, and whether a body was identified. Often, as in the coroner’s register, there is discrepancy within the same document. One finds in the inquest index, for example, two names that do not appear on the coroner’s list. They are listed in the Montana Industrial Accident Report, however, and one of their names also appears on the Granite Mountain Memorial to the unidentified victims at the Mountain View Cemetery. Other names appear and disappear on various official lists and in newspaper articles published day to day at the time. Based on available information, it is nearly impossible to state the exact number of fatalities.

“Some have accused the mining companies and their company-owned newspapers of deliberately muddling the information in an attempt to limit benefits paid to miners’ dependents. Others have blamed the confusion on the incompetence of those involved. A more realistic conclusion is that the simple enormity of the Speculator tragedy is to blame. Unorganized rescue efforts began by 1:00 a.m. on June 9 within an hour and a half of when the fire started. Those frantic first hours undoubtedly offered little opportunity to document who was involved. Organized rescue attempts, begun later that morning, involved different mining companies, mine shafts, and mines. Gas had contaminated the air in more than 300 miles of underground workings, each mining level and innumerable drifts had to be searched for bodies, and a thousand feet of the Granite Mountain shaft as well as other mining areas had caved in and had to be cleared during the search. In addition, lower levels of the Speculator Mine, from the 3,000- to the 3,700-foot level, where at least one body was found, had been flooded and had to be pumped.

“Confusion also arose from the inability to identify many of the dead. It was noted that those who died by fire had their extremities burned off. Indeed, in one of the more horrifying incidents, two individuals were incinerated on a cage at the collar of the Granite Mountain shaft in front of people assembled at the site. Some bodies had swollen into grotesque shapes, while others rapidly decomposed in the gaseous air. The stench was severe, and many were buried quickly upon removal from the mine. Sources estimated the number of unidentified bodies variously from 65 to 74, and Richard’s Funeral Home added to the discrepancy when it noted that “one sixth of forty six bodies” was buried.

“After the Speculator fire of June 8, the local press and a representative of the North Butte Mining Company hinted that pro-German sympathies may have been responsible for the fire. A letter on company stationery stated that carelessness caused the cable to fall, and that Ernest Sullau was born in Germany and his parents still resided there. The New Republic emphasized similar themes, stating that pro-German influence in Butte was possible and that the companies were emphasizing this in their attempt to stifle criticism of their methods of operation.

“Labor, which had been seething since the introduction of the open shop and rustling cards, an elaborate blacklisting scheme, considered the massive number of deaths in the fire the final insult. Butte’s first major mining strike in thirty-nine years erupted as the miners walked off the job within a few days of the disaster. The local press, controlled by the mining companies, announced that there were no worker grievances and that pro-German influence had caused the strike. The Industrial Workers of the World, labeled antiwar, socialistic, and reportedly pro-German, provided a convenient scapegoat. When Frank Little, an IWW general executive board member and head of its metal mines division, came to Butte to organize the strike, he was assassinated by “unknown assailants.” Montana Senator Henry Meyers, who claimed that Little’s murder could have been avoided if he had been censured and arrested for the content of his speeches, proposed enabling legislation. Seeking to correct a loophole in the Espionage Act of 1917 that allowed Little to freely express his opinions, Meyers quickly introduced a national sedition bill into Congress that would severely restrict freedom of expression. That bill was delayed in committee, but a similar state-level measure, the Montana Sedition Act, faced no such difficulty, and the Montana Legislature passed it in special session in February 1918. Congress followed suit in May by passing the national measure, which amended the Espionage Act of 1917. The laws, enforced on both state and federal levels, were two of the more repressive pieces of legislation in American history and were used to suppress the civil rights of socialists, pacifists, the IWW, and others until 1921. Enforcement of the federal measure, for example, resulted in the trials of such individuals as Socialist labor leader Eugene Debs and Congressman Victor Burger. ….
“Few events could more adequately depict a turning point in a community’s history than did Butte’s Granite Mountain-Speculator fire. As the place of the nation’s worst hard-rock mining disaster, it stands as an important national labor heritage site. In addition to the magnitude of the immediate tragedy, the fire served as a catalyst for labor militancy and repressive state and national legislation that helped squelch labor and social protest not only in Butte but throughout the nation….” (Harrington. A Reexamination of the Granite Mountain-Speculator Fire. MT Hist. Soc.)

Cole: Smoke inhalation was the cause of death. (Cole. History of MSHA, slide 26.)

The Granite Mountain Speculator Mine Butte, MT Memorial: “In 1991, a VISTA volunteer, Gerry Walter, assigned to the Butte-Silver Bow Historic Preservation office, researched the story of the Granite Mountain/Speculator fire. Sources for her research included: the Butte Archives, where she went through the 1917 newspapers and the coroner’s report from June 1917; Montana Tech Library had copies of the Engineering and Mining Journals and the 1917 Montana Industrial Accident Board Report; and, with the support of Al Hooper, she had access to the limited North Butte Mining Company Records, documents of Lessons from the Granite Mountain Shaft Fire, Butte (Bureau of Mines, Department of the Interior, 1917), picture files from the Butte Mining Museum, and Al’s in-depth personal records on the Granite Mountain/Speculator Fire.

“….She discovered that, in June 1917, the city council voted unanimously to erect a memorial ‘so that future generations would not forget the men who died.’ Committees were formed, but nothing came of the resolution.

“Gerry, dedicated to preserving our mining heritage, decided a memorial indeed needed to be built, and she would lead the effort to see that it was done. She formed an advisory committee to advance the goal of getting a memorial erected.

“Seventy-nine years after the disaster – on June 8, 1996 – the Granite Mountain/Speculator Memorial was dedicated to those 168 miners who lost their lives. A rededication ceremony took place on June 6, 2010, highlighting the new features of the Memorial.
….
“The creation of the monument took much work and involved many entities including:
• Walkerville City Council
• Butte Silver Bow government (BSB)
• Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
• State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO)
• Advisory Council for Historic Preservation
• National Landmark District and Region
• Regional Historic Preservation Plan (RHPP)
• BSB Chamber of Commerce
• ARCO
• The many individuals and organizations that contributed their time and money, and
• All those who have purchased bricks.
“The Memorial is maintained and enhanced through the sale of engraved bricks that are placed in the Memorial floor. Brick orders are processed throughout the year; engraving is performed in early March, and installation of the bricks in the floor takes place annually just before the Memorial service that is on or near June 8.” (The Granite Mountain Speculator Mine Butte, MT Memorial. “The Story of the Memorial.”)

Sources

Chicago Daily News Almanac and Yearbook 1919. James Langland, (Ed.). Chicago: Chicago Daily News Company. Digitized by Google. Accessed 1-14-2023 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=vWQTAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA788&dq=Ohio+River+Steamship+Disasters#PPA13,M1

Cole, Jesse P. (MSHA District 4 Manager). “History of MSHA,” Leadership Intensive Course Mine Safety and Health Administration. No date. 48 slides. Accessed 1-11-2009 at: http://www.usmra.com/repository/category/mining/modified_History_of_MSHA.ppt#256,1

Fay, Albert H. Metal-Mine Accidents in the United States During the Calendar Year 1917. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1919, 80 pages.

Harrington, James D. A Reexamination of the Granite Mountain-Speculator Fire. Montana Historical Society. Accessed 4-8-2010 at: http://montanahistoricalsociety.org/education/cirguides/buttearticharrington.asp

Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA). Historical Data on Mine Disasters in the United States. Arlington, VA: MSHA, U.S. Department of Labor. Accessed 10-5-2008 at: http://www.msha.gov/MSHAINFO/FactSheets/MSHAFCT8.HTM

National Fire Protection Association. Key Dates in Fire History. 1996. Accessed 2010 at: http://www.nfpa.org/itemDetail.asp?categoryID=1352&itemID=30955&URL=Research%20&%20Reports/Fire%20statistics/Key%20dates%20in%20fire%20history&cookie%5Ftest=1

National Fire Protection Association (John Hall, Jr.). U.S. Unintentional Fire Death Rates by State. Quincy, MA: NFPA, 31 pages, December 2008.

Parrett, Aaron. “The Granite Mountain – Speculator Mine Disaster.” Big Sky Journal, summer 2017. Accessed 1-14-2023 at: https://bigskyjournal.com/granite-mountain-speculator-mine-disaster/

Safety Engineering, Vol. 38, No’s. 1-6, July-Dec, 1919. NY: Safety Press, Inc., 1919. Google digitized. Accessed 1-14-2023 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=BSHOAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA1&dq=Safety+Engineering+Vol+38&lr=0

Searl, Molly. Montana Disasters: Fires, Floods, and Other Catastrophes. Bolder, CO: Pruett Publishing Co., 2001.

The Granite Mountain Speculator Mine Butte, MT Memorial. “The Story of the Memorial.” Accessed 1-14-2023 at: http://www.minememorial.org/about/our-story.htm