1921 — Nov 14, Fire, Tenement House, 108 West 17th Street, NYC, NY — 11
Compiled by Wayne Blanchard; last edit 3-6-2025 for upload to: http://www.usdeadlyevents.com/
–12 Safety Engineering, Vol. 42, No’s. 1-6, July-December, 1921, p. 270. (Could not confirm.)
–11 NFPA. “Loss of Life Fires in Apartments and Tenements.” Quarterly, 34/3, Jan 1942, p. 237.
–9 Burned; occupants on the fourth floor.
–1 Injuries from jump from fourth floor.
–1 Burns; died in hospital.
–11 National Fire Protection Assoc. Spreadsheet on Large Loss of Life Fires (as of Feb 2003).
–10 New York Tribune. “Ten Perish, 30 Are Injured in Tenement Fire.” 11-15-1921, p. 22.
–10 Wellsville Daily Reporter, NY. “Nine Persons Burned to Death…” 11-14-1921, p. 1.
Narrative Information
Safety Engineering: “Twelve persons were burned to death and 30 injured.” Occurred at 3:10 a.m. (Safety Engineering, Vol. 42, No’s. 1-6, July-December, 1921, p. 270.)
Newspaper
Nov 24: “New York, Nov. 14. — At least nine persons are believed to have been burned to death in a tenement house fire here early this morning. Five bodies, all unidentified, were found near a doorway on the fifth floor and firemen later found three more bodies. Two men and one woman were seriously hurt and 30 others were treated for abrasions and shock. The building was a five-story tenement on West Seventeenth Street and was occupied by fifteen families. Firemen found the blaze originated in the basement, roared up through a shaft to the second floor where it spread out on the four upper stories.
“New York, Nov. 14. – Ten lives were lost and more than a score of people injured in a fire of unknown origin which partially destroyed a five story tenement on West 17th street before dawn today. The building was occupied by fifteen families, mostly Armenians and Greeks.”
“New York, Nov. 14. – Post office employes, from the sub-station across the street from the blaze saved many before the firemen reached the scene. One man became exhausted while clinging to a window ledge and fell to the street, suffering a fractured skull.” (Wellsville Daily Reporter, NY. “Nine Persons Burned to Death. Fire in a Tenement House in New York…” 11-14-1921, 1.)
Nov 15, New York Tribune: “Ten persons lost their lives and about thirty others were badly injured in a fire which swept through a five-story tenement house at 108 West Seventeenth Street early yesterday.
“Nine charred bodies were found had died in two rooms on the fourth floor of the building after the fire was under control. The tenth victim was killed leaping from a fifth story window. Two other tenants, now in hospitals, were injured so seriously that they are not expected to recover. There were about eighty persons asleep in the house at the time. Heroic work by firemen kept the death list from mounting higher. The dead are:
Miguel Quinonez, ten-year-old school boy, a native of Porto Rico.
Mrs. Providencia Urdinurrain, twenty-eight years old.
Mrs. Urdinarrain’s two-year-old son, Quaquin.
Felicita Alicia, forty-seven years old, Porto Rican maid.
A man thought to be Eloy Diaz, a dishwasher at Luchow’s Restaurant.
Tomos Orcionscis, twenty-five years old, a native of Argentina, button maker, three years
in this country.
Germon Torrea, thirty years old, native of Mexico, a linotype operator.
Benjamin Diaz.
An unidentified man about thirty years old.
Another unidentified man about twenty-two years old
“The two victims in a serious condition are Andrew Maliano, in the New York Hospital, and Mrs. Esposoria Rinonen, twenty-two years, at Bellevue Hospital.
“The cause of athe fire has not been definitely established, but it is believed to have originated in one of the numerous baby carriages that had been crowded into the hallway of the house, into which some one had carelessly thrown a lighted cigarette.
….
“The house is on old-fashioned structure, faced in brownstone, built inside entirely of wood and with a fire escape in the rear. It was mainly tenanted by Spanioards, Mexicans and Armenians. The fire was discovered about 3:20 a.m., when Julius Jayser, a clerk in the branch post office Station O, directly opposite the house, heard screams and saw a dozen women and children climbing out of windows onto a ledge on the second floor of the building.
“Summoning P. J. Kelly, the night superintendent of the post office, and three other clerks, a ladder was hastily obtained and run up to the ledge. Kayser, Kelly and other clerks then helped the terrified women and children to the street.
“By the time the firemen arrived flames were shooting from the windows on the third, fourth and fifth floors, and from points on the roof. Acting Battalion Chief McGuire turned in a second alarm. Men and women could be seen rushing to the windows uttering wild screams and then disappearing again.
“One man, Benjamin Diaz, leaped to the ledge of a window on the fifth floor clad only in a pair of trousers. Eith the flames shooting out from behind him he grasped the ledge of the window from which he hung by his finger tips. Members of Hook and Ladder 12 drew up, and while preparing to run a ladder up to him shouted to him not to let go. Diaz, however, lost his grip and fell to the pavement, striking head first. He died shortly after in Bellevue Hospital….” (New York Tribune. “Ten Perish, 30 Are Injured in Tenement Fire.” 11-15-1921, p. 22.)
Sources
National Fire Protection Association. “Loss of Life Fires in Apartments and Tenements.” Quarterly of the National Fire Protection Association, Vol. 34, No. 3, Jan 1942, pp. 237-238, 244, 246-247.
National Fire Protection Association. Spreadsheet on Large Loss of Life Fires (as of Feb 2003). (Email attachment to B. W. Blanchard from Jacob Ratliff, NFPA Archivist/Taxonomy Librarian, 7-8-2013.)
New York Tribune. “Ten Perish, 30 Are Injured in Tenement Fire.” 11-15-1921, p. 22. Accessed 3-6-2025 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/new-york-tribune-nov-15-1921-p-43/
Safety Engineering, Vol. 42, No’s. 1-6, July-Dec, 1921. NY: Safety Press, Inc., 1922. Google digitized. Accessed 9-22-2017 at: http://books.google.com/books?id=bCLOAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_v2_summary_r&cad=0
Wellsville Daily Reporter, NY. “Nine Persons Burned to Death. Fire in a Tenement House in New York…” 11-14-1921, p. 1. Accessed at: http://newspaperarchive.com/fullpagepdfviewer?img=188384520&sterm