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In mid December, 1903, Margaret and Reinhold Graff
traveled about seven hours by train into Chicago.
They looked forward to spending the Christmas
holidays with two of their three grown children who
had relocated there. Albert was building a
provisioning business and Anna had just celebrated
her first wedding anniversary with Luther Newby. A
third child, Frank B. Graff, had remained in their
hometown, Bloomington, Illinois, and worked with his
father in the family-owned grocery on East Grove St.
In Chicago, Margaret stayed with Anna and Luther at
their apartment in the Drexel Hotel at the corner of
Oakwood and Drexel while Reinhold stayed with Albert
on the west side of Chicago. Luther traveled to a
teachers convention on Wednesday but would have been
home to celebrate New Year with his wife and her
parents.
Anna's husband, Luther G. Newby (b.1864), was a sales
rep for Rand McNally, selling textbooks and educational tools to schools and
teachers. Before heading out of town with his boss, Chauncey F. Newkirk, to
a teachers convention in Indianapolis, he purchased tickets for Anna and
Margaret to attend the Mr. Bluebeard matinee at Chicago's elegant new
Iroquois Theater. The seats were in the parquet, making Anna and Margaret
two of only a handful of fatalities among first floor audience members.
German immigrants Reinhold Graff (1840-1913) and
Margaret Lamp Graff, lived at 819 East Grove St. in
Bloomington, Illinois, about three hours southwest
of Chicago. Reinhold was a well-known grocery store
owner. Though not wealthy, Graff's grocery was
prosperous enough to afford a servant, and the
Graff's owned their home.
Reinhold was Margaret's second husband. Her first
husband, Jacob Leiser, a soldier in Company E of the Illinois 24th
Infantry, had died during the civil war. Margaret had immigrated to America
from Kiel, Germany with her brother, Marcus Lamp.
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Anna Newby was survived by her husband (Reinhold), two sons
(Albert and Frank), four brothers (Charles, Joseph, Marcus and Henry), and
one sister (Lena).
Thirty-nine-year-old Luther Newby was a native of Spiceland, Indiana, one of
seven children born to the North Carolinian Quaker family of Albert and
Caroline Newby. He had gone to work at Rand McNally after two years at
Earlham College in Indiana.
Luther and his boss, Chauncey
F. Newkirk, were staying at the Claypool Hotel in
Indianapolis. Upon hearing about the theater fire,
both men had cause to become very fearful. Luther
had purchased his wife's Bluebeard tickets and
Newkirk knew his wife was going to the theater that
afternoon. Late the night of the fire, Newkirk
received a reassuring telegram from his wife. She'd
gone to a different theater.
In an initial phone call, Luther was told that Anna
escaped but in subsequent calls learned she was
missing. He boarded a train back to Chicago.
Reinhold identified his wife's body and Luther
identified Anna's. Both women were buried in
Bloomington, probably in the same family plot though
this has not been verified.
In the years after the fire
Luther married several times
after Anna's death, and fathered a couple children.
By 1918 he was married to Grace B. Buragher Newby
and lived in California. He joined with his younger
brother Henry in the Troy Laundry of Pasadena,
eventually becoming the firm's president. Perhaps
harkening back to Luther's years with Rand McNally,
there was an employee library in the restrooms at
the laundry.
Reinhold Graff also remarried, to Marie Fleischmann.
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