![]() There were 19 cases of heat prostration in just one department of a big Waltham, Mass., watch factory on August 10. (As if the smell of horse manure wasn’t bad enough.) People were found unconscious in coal sheds, in the woods, on the pavement. Horses dropped dead in the street, 120 in one day in Boston. Officials believed the heat killed him and caused his body to decompose after only one day.ĭeath certificate of a man killed by excessive heat.įarmers left their fields, public works projects suspended and factories closed. It belonged to Patrick Curran, a log driver who had probably gone into the barn to sleep. In Holyoke, Mass., some boys playing around a barn noticed a body inside. On Tuesday, August 11, the Boston Globe reported a “startling list of fatalities from the excessive heat.” Ten died in Boston that day, 20 on Wednesday and 15 on Thursday. On Monday, August 10, five people died in Providence. ![]() Then the death toll began to alarm New Englanders. Killer Heat WaveĪt first the scorching weather only seemed to kill people who had to work outside all day - mostly Irish laborers who worked as teamsters, longshoremen, blacksmiths and railroad workers. Not only has it piled up the death rate to alarming proportions, but it has kept all humanity sweltering in perspiration and maddening heat. …No warm wave which has visited this country in recent years has held out longer, has been more continuous in its intensity, or more fatal in its results. Millions suffered without refrigeration or air conditioning from Boston to New York to Chicago. Humidity hovered at 90 percent, and there wasn’t a breath of wind. history.įor 10 days, the temperature soared to 90 degrees and higher, while staying above 70 degrees at night. The heat wave, which lasted nearly two weeks, ranked as one of the worst natural disasters in U.S. The Boulevard at Revere Beach, which offered relief for city dwellers during the heat wave of 1896.
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