Boy Who Jumped Tells of Tragedy |
CHICAGO - Dec. 2, 1958 - A boy who jumped out of a second floor window lived to tell about it. |
He is Frank Gallo, Jr., 10, of 3147 Augusta blvd., a fifth grade pupil in Our Lady of the Angels school. |
From his bed in St. Anne's Hospital, Frank told how his class was studying geography. |
He and the other 45 or so pupils were reading about the Middle Atlantic states, Frank recalled. He said: |
“A kid in my room jumped up out of his seat and hollered, 'smoke.' And smoke started coming through the cracks in the door. |
“Our nun was writing on the blackboard. She told us to open the windows and start praying. |
“Then everybody started runnin' toward the windows 'cause they couldn't breathe. She (the nun) just stood there, cool as a cucumber.” |
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Frank said five boys jumped out the window, then he hoisted himself on the sill, sat down and slid off, just as if her were easing himself into a swimming pool. |
When he hit the ground (” hard dirt with stones on top”) he said. |
“I felt like my back was broken. I crawled along a while and then got up. A lot of them couldn't get up. |
“I walked into a story - a little one across the alley from school. |
“I wanted to call my mother and tell her to come and help us and bring a car.” |
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The proprietor of the store, however, wasn't there, having been attracted by the commotion across the street. |
Frank went back outside. He said: |
“Fire trucks were coming and everything.” |
Frank, who incurred possible internal injuries and possible fractures, doesn't know it, but the nun of whom he spoke, Sister Mary Clare Therese, is dead. |