Mary Alice Dunn, 11, schoolgirl, saved Coleman C. Wiley, 24, cooper, and others from burning, Louisville, Kentucky, September 16, 1944. At night fire broke out in the kitchen of the three-story brick rooming house which was Mary’s home, which prevented lights from being turned on. From her room in the rear of the second floor Mary ran down a rear stairway and through a hall, both dense with smoke, and awakened her grandmother in a room close to the kitchen, which was full of flames. Returning to her room, in which her mother was, by way of a stairway at the front of the house, she was able to open the door only slightly; and dense smoke issued. She then ran to a room over the kitchen, opened the door, and called an alarm to a roomer. Heat was intense, and flames were on the rear stairway near by. In dense smoke she groped along the wall of a hall toward the front of the house and opened or rapped on doors of the other rooms on that floor. She then ran up a stairway to the third floor and rapped and called an alarm at the three rooms on that floor. Running down the stairways to the front door and outside, she turned in an alarm, then re-entered the house, and ascended the stairway to the second floor. Dense smoke caused her to cough violently; and holding her hands over her face, she descended the stairway and ran outside. Firemen were approaching. Wiley and others from the second floor ran out of the front door. The occupants of the third floor appeared at windows and were rescued by firemen on ladders. In addition to Mary, 14 persons escaped and three, including Mary’s mother and grandmother, lost their lives. 40486-3424
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