Hartford Circus Fire: Men Outside Smoking Ruins
DateJuly 6, 1944
MediumPhotography; gelatin silver print on paper
ClassificationsGraphics
Credit LineThe Newman S. Hungerford Museum Fund
Object number1988.134.3-K2
DescriptionTwo young men, one of them wearing a beaked cap, stand in the foreground. Two firemen in uniform are at the right. Another man, apparently wearing a military uniform, is at the left. Water shoots from a fire hose at the right. Smoke rises from bleachers, visible in the left background. Trailers are in the right background.
Label TextThe Hartford Circus Fire took place in Hartford, Connecticut, on the afternoon of July 6, 1944. The large tent housing the main performance area of the circus caught fire and burned at an incredibly rapid rate. The tent had been soaked with a mixture of gasoline and paraffin in order to waterproof it, and as a result once it started there was no stopping it. Several hundred people were injured, and 168 people were killed.
Status
Not on view
July 6, 1944
