| Smoldering School Ruins Like A Cavern Of Death |
| By Joe Albright |
| In the drenched and smoldering ruins of Our Lady of the Angels parochial school, it is almost impossible to feel disaster. |
| The rooms and halls where nearly fivescore died Monday suggest a subterranean cavern. Blackened plaster boards dangle from ceilings like stalactites, dripping water. Black-faced firemen poke through classroom rubble like archeologists — only not so gingerly. |
| They don't have to be so careful—the bodies they seek are dead four hours, not 4, 000 years. |
|
| Then the spell breaks. A fireman carrying a pickax says: |
| “Hey, reporter, you got any dry cigarets?” |
| The answer is no. |
| “Well, then can you tell me how many are dead?” |
| The answer stuns him. |
| He points to a mound of debris in the second-floor classroom, caused by the cave-in of a section of roof. |
| “There may be more in there,” he says. |
| Charred and soaked school-books, plaster and cinders are ankle-deep on the floor. A copy of Charlotte Bronte's “Jane Eyre” has covers singed off. |
| Then there is an eighth-grade spelling book. Among the words its owner spelled right were “skeleton,” “ambulance,” “safety,” “sadistic.” |
| And neatly handwritten is the sentence: |
| “What is the definition of 'fiery'?” |
| One girl wrote the sentence before she died. |
| In another second-floor classroom, geography books left on the desk tops remain open. |
|
| On the desk of Annette La Mantia, 10, of 840 W. Springfield, is a wallet. It contains a picture of a boy friend and a little brother. |
| She'll never see them again. She was one of the victims. |
| In the second-floor halls, bone-weary firemen work mechanically. There are none of the customary wisecracks and at least one of them is praying that his child is not in the County Morgue. |
| Illuminated by the powerful fire department hand torches, the death rooms cease to look like caves. Instead, the specter of a gaunt architectural skeleton has been created. |
| The building's flesh—the lath and plaster ceilings, the linoleum floors, the plastered walls—has been picked off by the fire. What remains is wooden balloon frame construction resembling blackened ribs. Wire - bearing metal conduits are the arteries. |
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| A statue of Jesus stands on a pedestal, almost untouched by falling timbers. Its gilt is black and an ear is missing. |
| A porcelain flowerpot is in the form of a Virgin Mary figure. The virgin smiles. The plant inside droops over the side, grotesquely scorched. |
| A first-floor classroom wall bears the slogan: |
| “Holy Communion is the shortest and surest way to heaven.” |
| A book jacket says: |
| “Are you listening? Maybe God is calling you.” |
| And out in the halls are rows and rows of little coats and hats. |
