command of General Funston, volunteer aids to all these,
and the husbands of terrified wives, and the sons,
brothers and other relatives who toiled for many consecutive
hours through smoke and falling walls and an inferno
of flames and explosions and traps of danger of all
kinds, often without food or water—toiling
as men never toiled before to save life and relieve
distress of all kinds—all these were examples
of heroism and devotion to duty seldom witnessed in
any scenes of terror in all time. There are brave,
unselfish men and heroic women yet in the world, and
all of the best of human nature has been exhibited
in large dimensions in the terrible disaster at San
Francisco.
Disaster Spreads Over the Golden State
The first news that the world received of the earthquake
came direct from San Francisco and was confined largely
to descriptions of the disaster which had overwhelmed
that city. It was so sudden, so appalling, so
tragic in its nature, that for the time being it quite
overshadowed the havoc and misery wrought in a number
of other California towns of lesser note.
As the truth, however, became gradually sifted out
of the tangle of rumors, the horror, instead of being
diminished, was vastly increased. It became evident
that instead of this being a local catastrophe, the
full force of the seismic waves had travelled from
Ukiah in the north to Monterey in the south, a distance
of about 180 miles, and had made itself felt for a
considerable distance from the Pacific westward, wrecking
the larger buildings of every town in its path, rending
and ruining as it went, and doing millions of dollars
worth of damage.
In Santa Rosa, sixty miles to the north of San Francisco,
and one of the most beautiful towns of California,
practically every building was destroyed or badly
damaged. The brick and stone business blocks,
together with the public buildings, were thrown down.
The Court House, Hall of Records, the Occidental and
Santa Rosa Hotels, the Athenaeum Theatre, the new
Masonic Temple, Odd Fellows’ Block, all the banks,
everything went, and in all the city not one brick
or stone building was left standing, except the California
Northwestern Depot.
In the residential portion of the city the foundations
receded from under the houses, badly wrecking about
twenty of the largest and damaging every one more
or less; and here, as in San Francisco, flames followed
the earthquake, breaking out in a dozen different places
at once and completing the work of devastation.
From the ruins of the fallen houses fifty-eight bodies
were taken out and interred during the first few days,
and the total of dead and injured was close to a hundred.
The money loss at this small city is estimated at $3,000,000.
