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George Bowen, age thirty-seven, and an unmarried
twenty-five-year-old female
attended the Mr. Bluebeard
matinee without a chaperone. In 1903
that was still uncommon, a
taboo left over from the Victorian era. More
unusual is that the female was his
sister-in-law, Lottie Langstaff.
Was his wife Lucile also in the theater
party but for some reason not mentioned
in the story? A reporting error?
The specification that his companion was
a Miss and not a Mrs. lessens the
possibility that the reporter confused
the first name of Bowen's wife. My searches for more information were
fruitless. I found the story
(above) in only one newspaper, the
January 1, 1904 issue of the Commercial
Appeal of Memphis.
Unlike nearly six hundred others, George and
Lottie escaped from the Iroquois
Theater, site of America's worst theater
disaster.
Note: There was no explosion.
There were two incidents in the fire
sequence that some audience members
perceived as explosions. The first
was when moorings for the multi-ton loft
burned away and it crashed to the stage
floor. It made the building shake
and was loud enough to be heard by
people outside in Couch Place. The
second explosive sound came soon
thereafter when a backdraft propelled a
ball of fire from the stage out into the
auditorium and up into the balconies.
That happened at 3:50 pm and killed all
who had not yet escaped from the
theater. The collapsing loft would
have been what George described else
he'd not have lived to tell his story.
It is puzzling that Bowen and Langstaff
remained in their seats so long; they
were lucky to have survived.
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Parents Alfred and Sarah Langstaff
Lottie and Lucile Langstaff were the
daughters of Alfred Denison Langstaff (1845 –
1913), a hardware and hardwood merchant from Canada, and Sarah
Ann McCall (1847–1942) of
Tennessee.
Alfred Langstaff was a co-founder of the
Memphis chapter of the Howard Association
that helped their community survive the
1878/79
yellow fever epidemic
Over 5,100 Memphis citizens died in the
epidemic, at one point taking fifty
lives a day. Langstaff also piloted
expeditions to New Orleans to take medical
workers and supplies to fever victims
between Memphis and Louisiana.
In September, 1878 Langstaff contracted the
mosquito-born virus himself and recovered.
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George Bowen
George C. Bowen (1866 – 1929) was from New
York. Prior to his marriage in 1896 to
Lucile Langstaff, he worked in the railroad
industry as a freight agent. After
marriage he and Lucile settled in Memphis
where he briefly went to work for her
father's hardware business but by 1900 had
become a realtor. His parents were
Abiel and Helen Bowen of Medina, New York.
Lottie Langstaff
Charlotte "Lottie" Golloway Langstaff
(1878–1943)* was born and
raised in Memphis. As a young woman
she frequently traveled to spend time with
friends in Louisiana, Brooklyn and Chicago,
keeping newspapers well apprised of her
movements.† Lottie attended the
Clara Conway Institute and the Dr. Garner
School and graduated from the University of
Texas.
Lucile Langstaff Bowen
Lucile Bowen (1873 – 1962) was active in the
Daughters of the Revolution chapter in
Memphis, as well in women's clubs.
Like her sister, no activity was too mundane
to call to the attention of newspapers.
She and George Bowen had one child, a
daughter named Sarah / Sara who did not
marry.
In the years after the fire
Lottie worked as a school teacher. She
married three times. Her first
marriage, (in October 1904, though some
genealogies report it as in 1899) to a
theater musician named Thomas G. Stone
(following in the steps of his father,
Charles Stone), ended in divorce, though
after his death she described herself as a
widow. She had her only child with her
second husband, Moritz C. Haubold.
Claiming the status of widowhood rather than
divorce was common in the late 1800s and
early 1900s. Lottie and Moritz's son,
Alfred Haubold, was named after Lottie's
father and brother. Her third husband, Franklin
Adams, died a decade before Lottie.
She died of a coronary thrombosis
while living in Houston, TX and was buried
there in Brookside Cemetery.
Lucile Langstaff Bowen lived with her daughter Sarah until her death at
age eighty-nine.
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