March 25, 1910 -- Wabash Avenue Fire Kills Twelve

March 25, 1910 – The work day has just begun at the L. Fish Furniture store at 1906-08 Wabash Avenue when the company’s auditor asks an assistant to go down to the fourth floor and fill three cigar lighters with benzene.  As he is filling the third lighter, the benzene bursts into flame, and he heads for the alley behind the building, telling no one of the mishap.  The fire makes rapid headway before it is discovered before the first alarm is turned in at 8:30 a.m.  Seventy-five people are at work in the building, and the employees on the first three floors are able to make it to safety.  Flames, however, cut off all escape on floors four through six.  Three serious impediments dim any hope of rescue.  First, there is a 4-11 fire in progress at Twenty-Fourth Street and Wallace that ties up half of the fire department’s equipment in the area.  Second, the first reports get the location of the fire wrong.  Finally, the raising of ladders is impeded by guy wires that support a large company sign on the front of the building as well as a large awning that covers the front entrance.  The fire is struck out in less than three hours, but during that time twelve people die in the inferno.  The coroner’s jury investigating the fire is blunt, saying, “We find the L. Fish Furniture Company censurable for negligence, carelessness and lack of foresight in not better providing for the safety of employees.”  [Hogan, John F. and Burkholder, Alex A.  Forgotten Fires of Chicago:  The lake Michigan Inferno and a Century of Flame.]

March 25, 1931 -- Golfers in Chicago get a new course to play as the new Lincoln Park golf course, begun the preceding April, opens for play. Beginning in 1929 the city trucked in tons of soil, dumping it in the lake to create 71 acres and a new nine-hole golf course. The original intent was to create an 18-hole course, but a lack of funding led to scaling back the project. Two million dollars later, Waveband Golf Course ran from Diversey Boulevard on the south to Montrose Harbor on the north. In 1991 it was renamed for a former commissioner of the the Park District Board, Sydney Marovitz. Note: Most sources list the official opening of the course as June 15, 1932. That was the date on which the English Gothic style clubhouse and clock tower, designed by Edwin H. Clark, pictured above, were dedicated.