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Thomas James McCann Jr. (1915 - 1927)

Thomas James McCann Jr.
Born in Turner, Caribou, Idaho, United Statesmap
Ancestors ancestors
Died at age 11 in Turner, Caribou, Idaho, United Statesmap
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Profile last modified | Created 23 May 2017
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Biography

7 KILLED BY GAS EXPLOSION IN IDAHO.

MORMON HALL WRECKED BY GREAT BLAST.

MORE THAN 200 BASKETBALL FANS NEAR DEATH WHEN TANKS FOR LIGHT SYSTEM EXPLODE.

Turner, Idaho, Jan. 27 -- (AP) -- Six persons were killed and nearly a score injured, 12 seriously, as a result of an explosion of acetylene gas, which wrecked a Mormon chapel and recreation hall here last night while a basketball game was in progress.

About 200 persons had assembled in the one story frame building for a game between the Turner and Central, Idaho, teams. Shortly after play started, the lighting system failed, and witnesses said, some one lighted a match. A terrific explosion followed, wrecking the rear wall.

As the players and spectators started for the only remaining exit at the front of the building, a portion of the ceiling fell, hurling timbers and plaster into the crowd. Before the hall could be cleared the front wall collapsed. Most of the dead and many of the injured were found near this exit.

The body of JAMES McCANN, the janitor, was found in the basement where he had apparently gone to inspect the lighting system tanks.

The bodies of his two sons and his brother, BRIGHAM McCANN, were found near the exit.

Two more bodies were identified as those of ELMER ANDERSON and IRAL LOWE, both members of the Central team. MRS. LOWE and MRS. ANDERSON, who had accompanied their husbands to the game, were injured.

Some of the injured said they were literally blown from the building.

Iowa City Press-Citizen Iowa 1927-01-27


FINDS INQUEST NOT NECESSARY.

CORONER MAKES HARD TRIP TO INVESTIGATE IDAHO BLAST ACCIDENT.

Grace, Idaho, Jan. 28 -- (AP) -- H. L. McHan, Bannock county coroner, drove 70 miles through two feet of snow to the scene of the explosion which Wednesday night took six lives and seriously injured a large number of persons attending a basketball game in Turner, Idaho.

Mr. McHan stated, after an investigation of the disaster, that no inquest is necessary. Mr. McHan also stated that there had been an error in announcing the number of dead and that six was the correct total. EDWARD McCANN, aged, 9 was erroneously reported to have died.

School in Turner was closed following the calamity that befell the community. During Wednesday night the building was used as an emergency hospital for the injured. The injured were removed Thursday to Grace, and parcelled out among the homes of relatives and friends LEAH THORPE, 12-year-old daughter of MRS. OLIVE THORPE, of Grace, found to have sustained a fracture at the base of the skull, was added to the list of seriously injured. Her progress within the next day or two will determine her fate, her attending physician states.

Two other victims, lying in critical condition, are MRS. J. H. HALE, of Turner, leg broken and badly burned about hips and face, and MRS. ELMER ANDERSON, of Central, leg broken and body badly bruised. Both were taken to Soda Springs hospital.

The body of IRA LOWE, teacher in the Turner school, killed in the explosion, has been shipped to his former home in Preston for burial.

Funeral services for the remaining victims will be held in the Grace L.D.S. church on Saturday afternoon at 1 o'clock. That the added horror of the flames was averted from the Turner catastrophe, the greatest tragedy that ever has descended upon the Gem Valley region, was due only to the quick and effective efforts of the unhurt, witnesses asserted.

Ogden Standard Examiner Utah 1927-01-28


LAST TRIBUTES TO VICTIMS OF IDAHO TRAGIC EXPLOSION.

FUNERAL CORTEGE IN DIFFERENT TOWNS OVER SNOW COVERED ROADS TO LAST RESTING PLACES OF THE BELOVED DEAD.

Turner, Ida., Jan. 29. (AP) -- The people of this grief stricken little settlement today paid their last tribute to four members of one family, victims of Wednesday's explosion which brought to a tragic and a neighborhood basketball contest. The victims, JAMES McCANN, his two sons JAMES (actual name is THOMAS JAMES[1] ) and MERIDITH (whos actual name is JAMES MEREDITH) and his brother, BRIGHAM.

The funeral cortege will move over the snow-covered highways, piled two feet deep to Grace, where the services will be held in the chapel of the church of the Latter Day Saints of Jesus Christ (Mormon), burial will be there. The body of IRAL LOWE, another victim, was taken to his home at Preston, Idaho, and services are to be held there this afternoon. No arrangements have been made for the funeral of ELMER ANDERSON, Central, Idaho, the sixth victim of the explosion. His wife is among the seriously injured at the Soda Springs Idaho Hospital.

Las Vegas Daily Optic New Mexico 1927-10-29

Sources

  1. Find A Grave: Memorial #18527837 death certificate & obituary in memorial




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Categories: Turner Cemetery, Grace, Idaho