MetaFilter posts tagged with disaster and history

The Bethnal Green Disaster

Electric Dragon — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 14:47:29 -0800

On March 3rd 1943, the worst civilian disaster of the Second World War killed 173 people, including 62 children. During an air-raid alert, the noise of a new anti-aircraft battery panicked the crowd trying to get into the shelter at Bethnal Green tube station. In the dark, wet conditions, someone tripped and fell at the foot of the stairs, blocking the pathway and knocking others over in a domino effect. More and more people continued to pile in at the top leading to a massive and deadly crush. In order not to unduly alarm the populace, many details of the disaster were suppressed at the time, and the report of the official inquiry was kept secret until after the war - only on the 50th anniversary was a memorial plaque erected. A proper memorial is planned, which will list all the victims. Their website also has a series of recollections from survivors and relatives of victims.

The Great Baltimore Fire of 1904

dhammond — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 01:31:29 -0800

"To suppose that the spirit of our people will not rise to the occasion is to suppose that our people are not genuine Americans. We shall make the fire of 1904 a landmark not of decline but of progress."

Bath of Fire: The Worst and Most Forgotten Mass Murder of American Children

jonp72 — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 13:45:34 -0800

America's worst school violence ever was not a recent event, but the Bath School disaster of 1927. Andrew Kehoe, a school board member upset with his tax bill, used dynamite and some pyrotol from WWI-era military surplus to blow himself up along with the elementary school of Bath Township, Michigan, leaving 45 dead and 58 injured. See a 1927 book on the disaster, a list of victims, the coroner's inquest, a historical marker, a memorial park, an oral history from a witness, and a 1920s KKK rant denouncing Kehoe as an agent of the Roman Catholic conspiracy.

Terrible affair that General Slocum explosion...

Vidiot — Tue, 15 Jun 2004 18:09:07 -0800

One hundred years ago today, 1,358 members of the Kleindeutschland, the German neighborhood on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, boarded a chartered ferry named the General Slocum for a picnic excursion to Long Island. A fire broke out in the ship's hold while it cruised up the East River, the captain ran the vessel aground on the rocky shores of North Brother Island amid the swift currents of Hell Gate, and when it was all over 1,021 people (mainly women and children) had perished by drowning or from the fire, and it remained the worst single-day New York City disaster until 9/11.