It's after 3AM here in Phoenix and I am wide awake thinking about the horrific fire, the 47th annniversary of which will be tomorrow. I was just a kid in kindergarten at the time and I went to school in the AM at OLA. Our class was housed half a block from the school in a three flat called Mary Hall. On Monday December 1, 1958 the day started as did all of the others since the previous September. I loved going to school and that day was no different than any other morning. My aunt came to pick me up when class ended to take me back to her house. My mother was in a TB sanitarium at the time and had been there for almost two years. She was also away in the sanitarium for the first year of my birth. When my aunt arrived to pick me up she announced that we were going out to lunch at Woolworth's. I thought that was way too cool at the time but while we were eating she announced that my mother would finally be coming home later in the week. I barely remembered my mom at the time and also barely remembered the house we owned and lived in two years prior. My baby brother was born in January 1958 and he would finally be coming home from the foster family as well. We would finally, after so very long, be a complete family again. Lunch was wonderful and then we wandered over to the toy section of the store so I could make all of my Christmas wishes to Santa. My aunt wrote down everything that I wanted and it was looking to be a great holiday for me. She assured me that she would mail my list directly to Santa and things were really going great. We spent a pretty fair amount of the early afternoon viewing toys and then a bit of Chicago Ave. shopping before heading home. When we ready to head home I remembered that I forgot a bag at school. The teacher gave each student a bag filled with tape and construction paper to make ornaments for our Christmas trees at home. I pleaded to go back to the school to pick up the bag and my aunt agreed to do so. We walked up Hamlin Ave to Mary Hall and I ran inisde to collect my bag of goodies. I was very anxious to start making decorations for the holidays. Since we were so close, I thought that perhaps I could con my aunt into some change for the candy store, which was only a block or so away. She handed me a quarter, on the condition that the candy I purchase last at least a couple of days and off we went to Barbara's store. I felt like I won the lotto and was very eager to get to the store. But when we turned the corner from Hamlin to Iowa little did I know that my world would be changed forever. We could see the smoke and numerous fire trucks began arriving. We made our way to Avers Ave. near the candy store, and the crowd of people grew rapidly. I could see very little from my position so I decided to move in a bit closer. I eventually made my way pretty close to be able to see what was happening and the absolute horror of what was occruuing will be with me for a lifetime. I was standing next to an older Italian lady with a floor length heavy brown winter coat. In an instant she pulled me under the coat to try to block my view of what was happening. She was shouting at me to find my mother and I didn't know enough Italian at the time to explain anything to her. She pulled her rosary beads under her coat and together the two of us prayed. Little did she know but with me inside her coat there became a large gap for me to see exactly what was happening at the school. I still cannot speak the exact details of what I saw that afternoon. Suffice it to say that no five year old should ever have to see the things I witnessed on that cold but sunny afternoon. Most of what was covered in the books on the fire bear witness to the things I also saw. In spite of how well everything was handled by the teachers and fire department, it seemed like complete and total chaos to me. People were running and screaming everywhere and injured kids were walking around as well. I think my aunt went into a total state of shock, as did most of the folks at the fire that afternoon. It took her some time to finally realize that I was there too and she began a frantic search for me. My uncle and my father both left work upon hearing of the fire and thankfully my dad had the sense to call the sanitarium and ask one of the nurses to let my mother know that I was OK and already out of school for the day. In spite of the crowd, my aunt, uncle and father connected and all began searching for me. Little did I realize at the time but I was impossible to locate under this lady's coat, completely hidden from view. And I also recall it being very loud with folks screaming and crying - I probably wouldn't have heard them even if they were close to me. I pulled myself out of the lady's coat to become sick and remained outside her coat where I was finally found just as darkness was setting. My father was quite upset with my aunt for allowing me to be at the school during the fire but he eventually calmed down when he realized what she had witnessed as well. He also picked me up and hugged me so hard I thought he was going to injure me. I did not attend school the rest of the week. I don't know if classes were held for the Mary and Joseph Hall kids but I did not go to school. My mother arrived home on Thursday December 4th and it was a very welcome family reunion. It was great to be in my own house and with my mother and year old brother but the horror of the fire would not let go of me. I had great difficulty sleeping and could not get the horrible images out of my mind. All of the neighbors and relatives had, for weeks, been planning a big welcome home and baby shower for my mother. Since she was in the sanitarium long befoer my brother was born they felt the shower was long over due. It was planned to be an Italian feast. The party never happened. A few folks came over with a gift or two and a plate of food but there was no way that any kind of party could be held in the immediate aftermath of the fire. The following Monday I started school at Alfred Nobel - which was only a half a block from my house. I have no idea why I left OLA and regret not asking one of my folks for the reason before they passed away.
On my first day of class at Nobel I vividly recall the teacher asking me to speak very loudly and tell everyone my name. Then she asked me to tell everyone what school I came from. When I shouted Our lady of the Angels every student and even the teacher gasped in shock. I ran home - deciding right then and there that I would never return to school. That afternoon the teacher called my mother to apologise and to assure her that she had a long talk with my classmates and they all promised not to talk to me about the fire or do anything that would upset me. The following day wasn't much better for me. At mid morning we had our milk and cookies and then a 20 minute nap before continuing class. I did fall sound asleep but was awakened by what would be the first of many nightmares about the fire. I woke up screaming and once again ran home where things felt safe and secure. After a couple more of these occurrances I decided to quit school and hide out in our basement while I should have been in class. After a few more parent teacher conferences and a couple of teacher conferences with me, I decided to try school again. We came to an agreement that I would never nap and would help the teacher clean the class while the others napped. I really felt like I was being treated like an outsider by the entire class. No one ever talked to me and as I look back on things I think that's exactly the way i wanted things to be. It seemed to me that my real friends were back at OLA and I really did not want anyhthing to do with this new school or the kids in it. I hated everything about school all of a sudden and often times even saw Nobel school on fire as I was walking toward it for class. Things seemed to get easier for me at school with the passing of time. The nightmares finally stopped and I did get all the way through graduate school without much more cutting of classes. Fire drills at school absolutely terrified me and knowing that so many safeguards were in place gave me little in the way of relief. That seemed to solve the school problem but bed time was a very difficult time in our household. I hated going to bed and quiet often woke up screaming and soaked to the bone. Our family doctor recommended some sleep aids and a psychiatrist - both of which really eased the nightmare occurrances. We also did a lot of talking about the fire. I hear over and over that the fire was not spoken of in households but ours was quite different. I had no idea what death meant and could not understand how something so horriblwe could happen. Mt folks really tried their very best to help me to understand things, but to this day I think it is all way beyond the comprehension of a five year old. As I grew up, fire drills were a constant in our household. My brother and I would be awakened and put through a drill of what we would do under various circumstances. We also had a rope made fire ladder in our
bedroom and my dad even went as far as to purchase one for the tenants in our two flat. When my father passed away in 1994 my brother and I had the duty of emptying the house for evenutal sale. Far in the back of a closet I found a box containing every card I ever sent to my mother for every conceivable holiday. I also discovered that bag of stuff given to the kindergarten class just hours before the fire. It remains stapled closed to this day. I also discovered a letter written to Santa. It was written by an older neighbor girl on my behalf. I have saved it and it reads: Dear Santa,
I know you got my letter of Christmas stuff I need already but please throw it in the garbage.
I do not want any of the toys on the list.
I have a few wishes for you
Please don't ever let another kid die in a fire.
Please let all the burned kids come home before Christmas.
Please don't ever make my mother go away to that place again.
And could you not throw away the toys you got for me and give them to the burned kids in the hospital
Love tomnmy I did indeed get everying on my original Christmas wish list. I assumed that Santa never got my second letter or maybe he got it mixed up wuith someone else. I opened each gift very caerfully, knowing that I would have to rewrap the gifts for the kids still in the hospital. Once my father explained to me that the kids in the hospital were all too old to want to play with my toys, I accepted them. My time at Nobel passed, with each day a little bit easier than the last. While I was housed on the second floor of the school, by luck of the draw, my classes were the ones with the new fire escapes. My three years housed on the third floor were also spent in classes with fire escapes - years later I discovered that it was not the luck of the draw - but a very insistant mother wanting to insure the safety of her son. Part of my time in high school was especially trying for me. I went to Lane Tech and at the time I was in school there were constant bomb threats to the school and false alarm fire drills. I did my best to maintain myself and follow the rules, hoping for the best. As the years have passed, many of the images and memories have faded, yet others reamin so distinct and vivid - like it was only yestrday. And to finish - something very unusual was discovered about a year or so after the fire. On December 1, 1957, a year to the day before the fire my mother had lung surger in the TB sanitorium. My mother reveived 92 consecutive stitches during the surgery, followed by a inch or so break and then an additional three stitches where a tube was inserted.
It simply chilled us all to the bone that the stitch numbers were matched a year later with fatalities at the fire - 92 children and three nuns. My sincere and heartfelt wishes for a wonderful holiday season to all. tom margherone
tmtommytom@aol.com
|