Atlanta, GA Piedmont Stables Fire, May 1908

ATLANTA HAS ANOTHER FIRE.

One Hundred and Seventy-Five Horses Lose Their Lives and the Property Loss is $100,000-Flames Threaten the Business Section of the City.

Atlanta, Ga., May 11.-One hundred and seventy-five horses, two of them prize winners, half a block of buildings burned with $100,000 loss; a threatened panic in a crowded theatre nearby, and a half dozen persons injured, none seriously, summarizes a fire which to-night started in the business sections of Atlanta and for an hour threatened to make a cleaner sweep than did the flame which last week destroyed a million and a quarter dollars worth of property in another section of the city.

The block in which the fire started was made up chiefly of one-story wooden and brick structures.

The flames started in the Piedmont stables on Marietta street near Spring street.

Half a block away the Orpheum Theatre was crowded from floor to balcony with persons watching a vaudeville performance.

Manager KAHN was warned that the fire seemed serious and announced that owing to trouble in the gallery among negroes, it had been decided to abondon [sic] the performance. As the audience started to leave some one ran through the lobby shouting "Fire!" In another moment scores of men in the balcony began a rush from the exits. Fortunately cooler heads stopped this before it became serious. Half a dozen negroes were bruised in the first crush, but no one was seriously hurt.

The fire spread from the stable to a number of one-story buildings nearby and was stopped after a dozen of these had been burned.

The burned area covers part of the block bounded by Marietta, Spring and Bartow streets, and the Western & Atlantic Railroad tracks.

Charlotte Daily Observer, Charlotte, NC 12 May 1908
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Transcribed by Linda Houston. Thank you, Linda!