I was 11 years old when Our Lady of the Angels school burned. We lived a few miles away, near Ogden Avenue and Homan Streets. I remember how my family clustered around the TV and watched this horrible tragedy unfold. I think the news anchor had tears in his eyes as he read the details. I was a student at Howland Elementary School at 16th and Spaulding Avenues. The day after the fire, most of my classmates brought newspapers to school, and we read them in the school yard before class. The pictures of burned children were terrible. Schools did not have crisis counselors back then, and we were forbidden to talk about the fire in class. Instead, our school officials came into the classrooms and "inspected" students desks. They yelled at students who had lots of paper in their desks and said the messy desks were firetraps that could kill everybody in the classroom. We had many fire drills. In fact, my class spent one entire afternoon marching up and down stairs. Since this was before schools had public address systems, our fire alarm was a series of coded "bells". Each classroom had a placard with the fire bell codes posted on the wall. For example, 3 bells followed by one bell, followed by 3 bells meant the 16th Street exit was blocked, 3-2-2 meant the auditorium exit was blocked, 3-2-3 meant the Spaulding avenue exit was blocked, etc. My heart goes out to all victims and survivors of Our Lady of the Angels, their families, the first responders, and medical professionals who took care of the victims. I pray a tragedy like this never happens again.
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