Carl B. Towler, 38, bus driver, saved Mary Lynne, 1, and attempted to save Jacqueline K. Barrett, 3, from burning, Monroe, Georgia, November 23, 1965. Fire broke out in a house trailer where Mary Lynn was sleeping in the end bedroom and Jacqueline was asleep in the middle bedroom. Towler while driving a school bus saw flames inside the trailer. He ran to the living room door and opened it. Half of the living room was afire, and the kitchen furniture was in flames. Burning linoleum created dense acrid, smoke, and heat was intense. Towler shouted but got no response. He ran to another door near the end bedroom and opened it. Dropping to a prone position beneath the smoke in the hallway, he crawled to the door of the middle bedroom, which was next to the kitchen. He grasped the leg of the bed and shook it while calling loudly but received no response. Towler wriggled to within two feet of the flames in the kitchen but saw no one. Choking, he crawled back to the door and left the trailer. A girl said she had heard a child crying inside the end bedroom. Towler took a deep breath and re-entered the hall. He crawled to the end bedroom and opened its door. As dense smoke rapidly filled the room, Towler crawled to the bed and removed Mary Lynne. Choking and gagging on smoke he was forced to inhale, Towler returned to the door and emerged from the trailer with Mary Lynne. By then others had arrived, and the children’s mother told Towler that Jacqueline had been left in the middle bedroom. Towler again entered the hall and crawled to a doorway but could go no farther. Conditions were rapidly becoming worse. Choking, Towler made his way back to the door and went outside. A serviceman broke the window of the middle bedroom and climbed into the opening to his waist. Towler held the legs of the man, who felt about on the bed but found no one before being forced to withdraw. The spreading flames and intense heat soon melted the trailer’s frame. Firemen arrived. They extinguished the flames and recovered the body of Jacqueline from the ruins.
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