In the capitol city where I live, on a busy downtown intersection, is a small sign that has been on my mind lately. Above an emblem in a simple curve, are the words “Gave His Life in the Line of Duty.” And below, a name. “Lieutenant Michael J. Cloonan 8/16/1893.” The emblem is that of the St. Paul Fire Department.
This essay is a small backstory about that sign on a particular street in my neighborhood in the city of Saint Paul, Minnesota, and how ever-present history hides in plain sight. When we look, we see it, layered behind the present. It is everywhere.
The sign stands at the intersection of a wide boulevard and a major north/south street. The north/south, Robert Street, jumps there across the wide Mississippi River. Its original wrought-iron bridge, built in 1886 to handle horse-drawn wagons, forms the setting for this old story. Its more contemporary replacement is today’s backdrop. The bridge is a kind of framing element as we look back.
The boulevard, now named Kellogg, was then called Third Street; it ran, and runs, right along the top of the river bluff. Third Street had been the city’s premier retail hub. At the time of this story, the primary commercial activity shifted toward commission and produce merchants, second-hand shops, and employment agencies. I suppose this was particularly evident during the economic depression that had struck the country, and Saint Paul, hard earlier that year. The Panic of 1893 was the worst financial crisis in U.S. history up to that time.
A prominent business remained at 148-150 East Third Street on the corner in question. The W.J. Dyer and Brothers company, reputed to be the largest music store west of Chicago, sold sheet music, pianos, organs, and musical instruments.
On August 16, 1893, their building, full of flammables, caught fire.
In the newspaper language of the day (with the mis-spelled last name, and the varying typefaces) from the St. Paul Globe of August 17, 1893.
DIED DOING HIS DUTY
Lieut. Michael J. Cloonen, of the Fire Department
KILLED AT A DISASTROUS FIRE
One fireman was instantly killed, two others severely injured, and $35,000 of musical merchandise destroyed at a fire in W.J. Dyer & Bro’s establishment last evening…
The fire started in the rear of the top floor of the building in what is known as the repair room, and when the department commenced work the upper part of the structure was enveloped in a dense cloud of suffocating smoke, occasionally illumined by a burst of flames.
Engine Company #8 of the St. Paul Fire Department responded from their firehouse five blocks away, bells no doubt clanging, firemen clinging, equipment hauled by powerful horses. The long extension ladder was placed in the rear of the building and a line of hose pulled up, manned by three firemen, with Lieutenant Cloonan at the nozzle.
“The floods of water poured on the flames only made the fire the hotter, this being due to the quantities of oil, varnish and shellac in that part of the building. The smoke from the fire was of the most suffocating kind, but the firemen stuck to their perilous posts despite the stifling cloud.
“The three men on the ladder in the rear of the building were getting the worst of the smoke, but they hung on to the ladder and kept the water from their line directly on the fire. Lieut. Cloonen, who had been managing the nozzle, was about to be relieved by Capt. Strapp, who was just below him on the ladder, and Strapp had swung partly off the ladder to allow Cloonen to step down when, to the horror of his companions and the spectators, Cloonen was seen to sway backward and, in an instant, his body was falling through the air. Cloonen in his fall turned over twice and struck the ground on his face and body. So quickly was the thing over that before the men at the foot of the ladder were aware the lifeless body of their companion was at their feet.”
…What was the gas? Ether, likely, for it is largely used in polishing up of old musical instruments. The probability is that there was a large quantity of the volatile fluid in the room for this purpose, and that when the fire reached it the fumes went pouring in a vast volume through the window.
Michael Cloonan was overcome and fell; soon his colleagues on the ladder had to flee.
I know that I live in a city full of history, but I am struck by the well-known St. Paul names that occur in this story from 133 years ago.
Cloonan was called to this fire…to his death…from Engine Company No. 8. Engine No. 8 is still operating in St. Paul; its house is now at 65 East 10th Street; their runs often go by this very corner. His colleagues were carrying him toward a doctor on Jackson Street when he died. Jackson Street is one block over. His remains were taken to Willwerscheid’s ‘undertaking parlor’; there is still a Willwerscheid Funeral Home in the city today. One of his colleagues, similarly overcome, was transported to St. Joseph’s Hospital, then and now on Exchange Street.
Cloonan was thirty-three years old, born and raised in St. Paul. He was a member of the Junior Pioneers social and historical society, and so was probably the son of an original settler. He belonged to the Ancient Order of Hibernians, the country’s oldest Irish Catholic fraternal organization. There is still a local chapter today.
Cloonan was a member of the Firemen’s Relief Association, which provided support to his widow and four small children. Relief would have been necessary. His name appears on a present-day list from the Minnesota Fire Service Foundation, of firefighters “for whom we have been unable to locate families.” If his descendants could be found, the Foundation, it says, would like to recognize them.
Cloonan’s name appears, with 254 others, on the Fallen Firefighters Memorial on the State Capitol grounds.
Although over time history can go subterranean, it is good to remember that we walk through a world drenched in the past. Today, on that concrete corner in my neighborhood, people walk by, a small park is largely unused, and traffic rushes, occasionally including a fire truck from Engine #8. 133 years ago, it was the scene of a deadly fire. It ignited and caught, was discovered, burned high and hot, forming smoke and toxic gas. The alarm was turned in at 6:30 pm. The fire department rushed there, with their heavy engine and equipment. Spectators probably crowded to watch. It must have lit up the city sky as the evening came on. A man, whom today we would call a first responder, was first up a long ladder at the nozzle of a hose that poured water on the flames. He was overcome by fumes and fell past his fellow firemen five floors to his death, 133 years ago, almost to the day. All that remains on the corner of Kellogg and Robert is a sign, and now we have noted it. We are thinking of you, young Lieutenant Michael Cloonan, son of pioneers, husband, father of four. Irishman, St. Paul-ite, fireman. Gone. Gone.
***
A few facts in testimony to the fascination of research and the hard work of firefighters: just two years earlier, and two blocks east, a massive fire consumed two warehouses and $1M dollars of merchandise. (about $37.1M today.) Three days before Cloonan’s death, in nearby Minneapolis, 23 blocks of neighborhood burned in a fire a mile wide. 1500 people were left homeless.
Thanks to the Saint Paul Fire Department for providing research material on Michael Cloonan. There are 52 such memorial plaques in the city.
Photo by the author. Newspaper sketch from the St. Paul Globe of 8/17/1893.
Graphics by Wylde Hare.
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