Our Lady of Angels School Fire
1958, December 1: "A great and indescribable horror"
On December 1, 1958 sometime after 2:00 p.m., a fire started in a trash drum in the basement stairwell of the Our Lady of Angels school, 909 N. Avers. At approximately 2:40 p.m. the first still and box alarms were called in. Engine 85 arrived at 2:44 p.m. By then, the fire had burned undetected for at least 20 minutes.
The fire spread into the stairwells and the second floor corridor, bypassing the first floor where heavy wooden doors leading to the hallway were shut. Hot air and gasses in the basement also filled an open shaft in a nearby wall, ascended two stories inside the walls and filled the cockloft above the 2nd floor ceiling. There, superheated air sparked flames in the north wing of the school. The flames eventually fell into the second floor corridor from ventilator grilles where they combined with dense smoke and gasses and made the hallway impassable. Inside the classrooms, light fixtures and transom windows exploded before the fire broke through the ceiling itself. Children and nuns were trapped. Windows offered the only egress and before any equipment was available for evacuation, children began leaping from them.
The parish priests and civilians who were first on the scene tried to evacuate the building. Engine 85, misdirected to 3808 W. Iowa, expected to find a fire in the parish church. Instead, the fire was raging in the north wing of the U shaped school on Avers, a building erected in 1910. As firemen rushed to the scene, a decision to ignore protocol and immediately request a 5-11 alarm was made. All available ambulances were also requested.
The fire was brought under control at 3:45 p.m. and the work of recovering bodies began. Ninety two students and three nuns died. One hundred sixty children were saved.
A Blue Ribbon panel was convened by Cook County Coroner Walter McCarron to investigate the fire. They found it to be of undetermined origin.
The Panel also made recommendations for fire safety in all schools not grandfathered into the 1949 amendments to the Municipal Code of Chicago concerning fire protection devices in schools. In 1959, Chapter 78 of the Municipal Code of Chicago was further amended under the heading "Schools" to include the recommendations. Among them were:
1. Enclose all stairwells with fireproof construction and provide fire doors leading into them.
2. Provide fire doors at all corridors and room partition openings.
3. Require automatic fire sprinkler systems in all school buildings
4. Provide approved automatic internal fire alarm systems linked directly to the Fire Department.
The fire at the Our Lady of Angels school was suspected to have been intentionally set. Over the years at least two individuals were closely investigated, confessed and recanted. No one has been charged with the crime.
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My name is Katharine Ann Robarge and I was in 2 second grade at OUR LADY OF THE ANGELES in 1958 I know that I was one of 7 kids in my class that went out the window and the rest of them died in the fire from smoke. The class I was in the teacher told us to stay in out seats but one boy who lived across the street from us told me Annie go out the window with us and I did. It's weird because that day I had to wear a new coat because I had wrecked my snowsuit and my mother told me if I lost my coat I would be in big trouble, so after I got out of the class room I went to the church and prayed that my mother wouldn't be mad at me My mom and dad looked for me and were told that I was in the class room and went to the church to pray and found me there. As it turned out I got to go to the drugstore and got an ice-cream soda (that was a big treat) There was a reporter there and he wrote a story about me and I have been trying to find what paper it was in and when I do I will e-mail it to you. When I got home my aunt Janet made my favorite dinner, fried chicken and mashed potatoes and gravy and I got soda with dinner. It was so long ago but I still remember it like it was yesterday. After the fire we moved to California and my mother remarried and my last name was changed to Swanson and then I got married and now my last name is Japes
------ Katharine Ann Japes
I am a survivor of the school fire "Our Lady of the Angels that occurred on Monday December 1st, 1958. My parents and myself moved to Pittsburgh PA. two years after the fire causing me not to stay in touch with many people there. I was fortunate to be on the first floor and got out uninjured. I remember our teacher heard the fire alarm go off approximately 2:45 and she thought it was odd we were being let out early. Little did we know the carnage and hell that was raging just behind us. A client of mine is a local firefighter and I made a comment about the fire I was spared from in 1958. He recently surprised me with a book I had no clue existed. Its title is " To Sleep With The Angels". This book has turned my life upside down as I have had deep memories of that day let alone many unanswered questions. I have always wondered about a classmate Bernadette DellDebio. I believe she appeared on the Sunday Parade Section of all newspapers issued nationally on Sunday approximately Oct/Nov 1960 displaying the new school. Due to the fire my Chicago phone number is ingrained in my head as I and many other children were placed in the homes across the street from the school and asked to try and phone home. My number was Albany 2-0293 and I lived on 222 Springfield. If any other survivors would like to contact me please do. Your age is now somewhere between 46 to 55. I need closure. God Bless all the Angels that did not survive as I always will hold you in my heart.
------- Marc P. Sparacello
Last Updated: February 22, 2003