A panoramic photo of the aftermath of the Iroquois Theatre, 1903.
One of the realities of ancestry research is that almost everyone you uncover is already dead, and if they died in a tragic, public way, there’s usually a lot of supporting material. That’s the case with two of our 1st cousins 4x removed, Ada Gertrude Markham and Emma Caroline Brown, who perished in the Iroquois Theater Fire 121 years ago today.
Markham and Brown were cousins—they shared grandparents James Jefferson & Elizabeth (Williams) Wilson, who are our 4th great-grandparents on the Woodard branch of the family tree. Grandpa Standiford’s grandmother, Sarah Ann (Wilson) Woodard (Winnie’s mom), was also a 1st cousin of Markham and Brown.
Ada Gertrude Markham was born in Monmouth, Illinois, on February 3, 1859, to Austin Spencer & Elizabeth Jane (Wilson) Markham, the oldest of their four children. The Markham family moved to Washington, Kansas, in the late 1860s. It was here that she met and married a Civil War veteran named James Edward Litch in 1875. She was 16 years old and he was 33. They then moved to Sterling, Colorado, where they had two children, George Austin in 1877 and Ella Sophia in 1878. They were still married as of the 1880 Census, but divorced soon after. In 1886 Gertrude married a man named Charles Benjamin “C. B.” Simpson. Together the couple raised George and Ella, who were 9 and 8 years old when their mother remarried, in the Colorado town of Brush. Charles was a businessmen who over the years sold insurance, real estate, and farm implements, and owned and operated a grocery and billiard hall that promised “clean, good sport.”
Emma Caroline Brown was born in Perry County, Ohio, to James C. & Cassandra (Wilson) Brown in 1853. She was the sixth of eight children, six girls and two boys. The family moved to Warren County, Illinois, in the late 1850s. Emma would have been six years old when her cousin Ada was born in Monmouth, the town just east of the Browns’ farm. Emma married a local farmer, Isaac Lehman Woods, in 1873; she was 20 and he was 21. They had two daughters: Faye (1884) and Irene Elizabeth (1890). The Woods family moved to Webster, Iowa, where in 1887 Isaac was elected to the Iowa General Assembly, a Democrat from a Republican stronghold. In 1895 they moved again, the time to the south side of Chicago when Isaac became president of a commissioned livestock brokerage, probably at the Union Stockyards of The Jungle infamy.
At Christmastime in 1903, Ada Simpson went to Chicago to visit her cousin Emma, and on December 30 the two decided to attend a play. A local Brush newspaper later reported:
One week ago last Thursday, December 31, this community was shocked and saddened when the news arrived that over 600 people had lost their lives in the Iroquois Theatre disaster in Chicago, and that Mrs. [Ada] Simpson was among the missing.
It was hoped by her many friends, that she might have got out of the theater and was still among the living, but a second telegram to her husband, C. B. Simpson, told that she was dead. Mr. Simpson left on the afternoon train to bring home the remains of his unfortunate wife.
Yesterday our citizens realized the sadness of it all more fully, when the grief-stricken husband and daughter arrived with their dead. . . . Fully one hundred people were at the depot to extend sympathy and help.
Mr. Simpson and daughter, Mrs. Ella McKinney, and little Helen McKinney were spending the winter months with relatives and friends in eastern states, and some weeks ago arrived at West Point, Illinois. From there Mrs. Simpson had gone to Chicago to visit, and on Wednesday afternoon, she, in company with her cousin, Mrs. [Emma] Woods, went to the Iroquois Theatre to enjoy the afternoon matinee of “Mr. Bluebeard,” which ended so sadly to them both.
The Iroquois Theatre Fire remains the deadliest single-building fire in US history (if you don’t count 9/11, which was more than a fire). Just 27 days after the “absolutely fireproof” theater opened to the public, roughly 2,200 patrons jammed into the venue that had only 1,600 seats, filling the aisles and “standing room only” areas at the back of the hall. They had come to see a performance of Mr. Blue Beard, and because it was a weekday holiday matinee, the audience was filled with women and children. At the beginning of the second act, a spark from an arc lamp ignited its stage curtain and flames raced up to its flammable painted scenery flats hung in the rafters. A stagehand tried to lower an asbestos safety curtain, but it jammed.
Eddie Foy during a performance with his elephant sidekick around the time of the fire.
The popular comedian and drag performer Eddie Foy, who played Sister Anne, ran onstage to keep the audience calm, and it worked for a while. But when fleeing patrons discovered locked fire exits, or doors that swung inward and couldn’t be opened against the throng, panic ensued and many were crushed. Firefighters later found piles of bodies that were ten deep. In all, 602 people died, about twice as many as perished in the Great Chicago Fire.
If there was something positive to come from the tragedy, it was fire safety reforms: exit doors that open outward with unlockable “panic bars,” fireproof scenery, and the first illuminated red exit signs. Think about your cousins the next time you go to a show.
Emma Caroline (Brown) Woods was buried in Oak Woods Cemetery in Chicago. Ada Gertrude (Markham) Simpson’s body was returned to Colorado and buried in Brush Memorial Cemetery, where her grave memorial mentions the Iroquois Theatre Fire. Chicago’s Nederlander Theatre was built on the site of the tragedy.
Emma Caroline (Brown) Woods (1853–1903) Ada Gertrude (Markham) Simpson (1859–1903)
A documentary on the Iroquois Theatre Fire was recently produced by the PBS affiliate in Chicago, if you want to learn more:
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