"I asked my father if the curtain was hung on Manila ropes, and he said that it was not, but that it was hung on wire cables. I know that to be a fact, for I saw the cables myself.
"I do not desire to shield any negligent person, but Stage Carpenter Cummings was not responsible for the lowering of the curtain only in so far as he was responsible for having some one there to lower it.
"I was on the stage when the fire broke out, having gone to the theater to see Archie Bernard, the chief electrician. The statement has been made that the lights were not thrown on in the auditorium after the fire was discovered. Just before the fire broke out Bernard was stooping down preparing to change the lights, and he had just said to me: 'I will show you how I change my lights.'
"When the fire was discovered I saw him reach down to throw a switch. Whether he threw the switch that lights the auditorium I do not know, but I do know that the fire from the draperies fell all around the switchboard and burned out the fuses. Consequently if the lights had been turned on the fact that the fuses were burned out would cause them to go out.
"The first I knew of the fire was when I heard some one behind and above me clapping his hands. I looked up and saw McMullen trying to put out the blaze with his hands. If he could have reached far enough he would have extinguished the fire. He did the best he could.
"I carried four women out of the theater and burned my hands. I stayed on the stage as long as it was possible for me to do so."
KEEPSAKES OF THE DEAD.
Many Chicago people spent a part of the Sabbath following the fire in the dingy little storeroom at 58 Dearborn street, where the effects and the valuables of the Iroquois theater victims are kept.
The storeroom was crowded all day. The line formed at Randolph street and pushed its way to the north. A mother stepped to one of the show cases. She had lost a boy and she had come to find his effects. She was looking through the glass when she called one of the policemen to her side.
"That's it. That's my little boy's," and she pointed at a prayer book.