Keyword search
(Iroquois-specific results
will appear at bottom of
search list):
Note: If this tab has been open in your browser for hours
or days, a new search may bring an access error or unproductive results. When that happens, position the cursor in the
"Enhanced by Google" search box above, then refresh your screen
(F5 on PC, Cmd-R on Apple, 3-button symbol at top right of screen on Android or iphone) and
re-enter your search words.
"The appearance of the balcony when our party reached it
was the most terrible that human eye could
contemplate. wedged together on the stairways or
standing upright were dead men, women, and children,
so entangled that it was difficult to separate them,
that the bodies might be taken out. Many clutched
the banisters, while others sat bolt upright in
their seats, apparently unharmed, with their
lifeless eyes denoting the terror they felt during
their last moments.
"The
appearance of the dead, especially those brought to
the Northwestern college building, indicated that
they had succumbed to suffocation rather than to
death by fire. Many bore the only evidence of a
struggle on their hands, which were torn and badly
lacerated as if they had fought for life or injured
themselves in the agony of death.
"Youths and
maids, little children, and aged men and women were
tenderly borne out by the police and firemen, l and as one after another was enfolded
in the sheltering blanket the thought was simply
impressed on the onlookers: 'How uncertain is life,
and often how brief the span from mirth to sadness!'
"Again, as the bodies were disentangled and drawn by ropes over
the roughly constructed bridge from the theater to
the Tremont House [Northwestern], one was forced to
ask himself if all were human bodies, and whether
it could be possible that they were in the full
enjoyment of life but a few moments before."
Father Muldoon in newspaper interview two days after the Iroquois
Theater fire.
Muldoon was one of several priests on the scene at the Iroquois
who administered last rites to individual victims as
well as to groups of victims at Northwestern and at
Thompson's diner. A few out of town newspapers
toyed with an improbable — and unsupported — tale of Muldoon as a hero who led the
rescue effort, but the story didn't survive the first
day of post-fire coverage. He granted
sacraments and selected the official Iroquois
Theater fire hymn (Lead, Kindly Light, 1833).
St. Charles Borromeo
Church in Chicago
The church in the prairie
west of Chicago had ample acreage at 12th and
Cypress* on which to grow but the conservative
middle-class congregation kept an eye on the
budget and did not expand prematurely.
For its first eleven years, one house served as
St. Charles Borromeo's church, rectory and
school. Sisters of Charity
taught students on the second floor.
When the church registry
numbered twelve hundred
families, the church began construction of
a new building. Designed by Martin Carr, the
impressive structure was
completed in 1897.
By 1899 there were nine hundred
students, five thousand parishioners,
twenty Sisters of Charity teachers and Bishop Muldoon
had three assistants.
Three months before the fire, twelve
hundred students registered for school at St.
Charles. One of those,
Mary Donahue, lost her life at the Iroquois,
as did the choir's former organist,
Edna Torney.
Reverend Peter J. Muldoon
(1863–1927)
Assigned in 1895 to the prairie
parish, twenty-six-year-old Father Muldoon
had been chancellor of the archdiocese
and secretary to the archbishop. He was a
native of California, educated at St. Mary's colleges
in Kentucky and Baltimore,
Muldoon.
An exhibit
Muldoon produced for the 1893 Columbian Exposition
brought recognition that helped advance his career.
The exhibit highlighted Catholic schools in the
Chicago diocese.
Nine months prior to the Iroquois
Theater fire archbishop Quigley appointed
Muldoon Vicar-general.
In 1908 Muldoon
left St. Charles Borromeo to become the first bishop
of a new diocese in Rockford, IL. Six hundred
Chicagoans turned out to wish him good luck in his
new assignment. Twelve years later it incorporated
one hundred fifteen priests
and one hundred fifteen churches,
thirty-nine schools, sixty-five
hundred students, an
orphan asylum, six hospitals and two retirement
homes.
St. Charles Borromeo was
razed in 1968 and is today the site of a high-rise
parking lot, across the street from the FBI.
While St. Charles still stood
it was rumored that Father Muldoon haunted the place.
Brothers Rocco and Daniel Facchini wrote a book about the
haunting: Father Muldoon, a True Chicago Ghost Story: Tales of a Forgotten Rectory.
If Muldoon was inclined to haunt, 'seems he would have
picked a church in his last diocese, Rockford, but
then what do I know about priestly ghosts?
Ordered a copy of Facchini's book to learn the
answer.
Discrepancies and addendum
* Today 12th street is Roosevelt
Road, renamed in 1919 to honor the late president
Teddy Roosevelt, and Cypress is Hoyne Avenue, and
their corner is a few blocks southwest of the
University of Illinois on Taylor St.
Polish immigrant
Kwasniewski Iroquois victim
Rectory housekeeper Mary
Neumann
Norton Sisters from Upper
Peninsula Michigan
Other discussions you might find interesting
Story 2723
A note about sourcing. When this
project began, I failed to anticipate the day might come when a
more scholarly approach would be called for. When my
mistake was recognized I faced a decision: go back and spend years creating source lists for every page, or go
forward and try to cover more of the people and circumstances
involved in the disaster. Were I twenty years younger, I'd
have gone back, but in recognition that this project will end when I do, I chose to go forward.
These pages will provide enough information, it is hoped, to
provide subsequent researchers with additional information.
I would like to
hear from you if you have additional info about an Iroquois victim, or find an error,
and you're invited to visit the
comments page to share stories and observations about the Iroquois Theater fire.
.
If Muldoon was inclined to haunt, 'seems he would have
picked a church in his last diocese, Rockford, but
then what do I know about priestly ghosts?
Ordered a copy of Facchini's book to learn the
answer.
