SCOUTING YESTERDAY: Explosives helped stop destructive Lead fire in 1900
This week in South Dakota history: March 7-13
A late-night blaze left blocks of Lead in ashes, 125 years ago this week. The town’s business district became a tinderbox as high winds fanned flames through the wooden structures that lined the Black Hills mining town.
Hours later, the town’s people turned to explosives to cut off the inferno.
Frequent updates were telephoned from Lead to The Daily Deadwood-Pioneer Times as fire swept through town. The details were published in the March 8, 1900, edition, summarized as follows:
“2:30 a.m. — Fire started in J.K. Searles meat market shortly after 1 o’clock and threatens to destroy two entire blocks. It has already destroyed the Searles building and the building next to it owned by P.A. Gushurst and occupied as a saloon...
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