After it was too late to save the building, I walked down to the Hotel Durban, on my property, which I supplied with water, to calm the fears of some of the guests who were agitated, when, to my amazement, I found a two-inch fire-hose turned on full, and running in the road. I learned then that a stupid fellow who was staying at the hotel, had turned the water on at several fire hydrants to play water on the hotel, although the hotel was at such a safe distance from the tool-house that there was not a particle of danger whatsoever. It never occurred to him to close off one hydrant when he opened another; consequently, the pressure was reduced so that no water at all could be had at the scene of the fire, and not pressure enough on the hose-pipes that he had turned on to do any good even had they been needed.
After things had quieted down, I returned to the house to resume my conversation, and to repeat my assurances to the young lady secretary, but I found a polite note tacked to the table-cloth, requesting that her trunk be forwarded the next day. She had not waited for further conviction as to the safety of her new position.
On investigation, I learned that a fire had started in the tool-house from some cause unknown, and had proceeded long enough to get one side of the interior of the building well ablaze. As there were five gallons of denatured alcohol in the place, and the same quantity of gasoline, and about ten pounds of sulphuric ether, it is probable that one of these had become heated and, bursting, set free a lot of vapor which, mixing with the atmosphere, exploded. There were also in the building about thirty pounds of finely pulverized aluminum, ten pounds of magnesium powder and other ingredients for flashlight powders, with which I intended to conduct experiments. As these materials were not mixed, they were not explosive, but their combustion was what produced the wonderful light when the explosion occurred. The result was not like that from an explosion of dynamite, in which case the building would have been literally blown to fragments, but, as is usual in gas explosions, the roof of the building was lifted up, the sides thrown out, and the roof dropped in. Even the front door of the building, charred from the initial fire, was found otherwise intact.