Married Frank Hales Kliss about 1888. She was born June 4, 1866 in Sanilac County, MI and died October 28, 1946 in Oshkosh, WI.
(Excerpted from "Phillips Destroyed By Fire in 1894, The Phillips Fire" by I.A. "Moose" Kenyon Mellen,Wis., August 16, 1942. Copyright has not been renewed, expired Aug. 16, 1970)
The loss of thirteen lives occurred among those who sought safety by crossing to the north shore of the lower lake. Frank Hales Kliss owned a large boat house that was built on a log float and anchored just below the box factory bridge. When fire threatened the day previous he had stocked the boat house with provisions for an emergency with the intention of poling the house, and float across the lake to a place of safety should the fire destroy the town. When the fire did come he took his wife and daughter and eleven of his neighbors, Mr. James Locke, and his wife Eva (Bursell) Locke and their five children; Hattie 7, Ruth 6, Myra 4, Thomas 1 1/2 and James 6 weeks and Mrs. David Bryden and her two children (Dave was in the woods running camp for the Shaw company) and with the help of James Locke, started poling down the channel and across the lake.
Things went well until they thought they had reached a point of safety where the wind would take them to the spot they had chosen on the north shore. But just then the fire hit the north lumber yard. One who did not witness it (your narrator did) could not imagine what a terrible thing those acres of burning dry pine lumber piles turned into. Flames shot a full thousand feet into the sky and the whole burning mass took on a rotary motion. Whole piles of blazing lumber were carried high into the air and the suction of the whirling mass seemed to draw everything loose toward it from hundreds of yards outside its periphery. The floating boat house was caught in this suction and drawn to the burning yard, whirling as it went like a spinning top.
The boathouse/log float's occupants took to small boats all except Frank Hales Kliss who was burned to death as he stood with a pike pole trying to hold the float against that terrible suction. A great tongue of flame from the yard reached out and took him just as one would snuff out a mosquito with a candle. Those in the boats fared a little better. The suction of the fire caused waves on the lake from six to eight feet high. And the boats were swamped before they had traveled a third of the distance across the lake. James Locke and his entire family were drowned. Mrs. Bryden and her two children suffer the same fate, as did also the little Kliss girl, Myrtle. Mrs. Mary M. (Locke) Kliss hung to the keel of an overturned boat until rescued by a man (James I. Kenyon) who fortunately had succeeded in getting his family across the lake before the lumber yard had turned into a whirling inferno. She was so badly burned about the head and face that she lost her eyesight a short time afterwards.
(Mary moved in with Frank's family, and eventually married Frank's half brother, Robert Rudolph Kliss. They both are buried in Oshkosh)
(Excerpted from "Phillips Destroyed By Fire in 1894, The Phillips Fire" by I.A. "Moose" Kenyon Mellen,Wis., August 16, 1942. Copyright has not been renewed, expired Aug. 16, 1970)
The loss of thirteen lives occurred among those who sought safety by crossing to the north shore of the lower lake. Frank Hales Kliss owned a large boat house that was built on a log float and anchored just below the box factory bridge. When fire threatened the day previous he had stocked the boat house with provisions for an emergency with the intention of poling the house, and float across the lake to a place of safety should the fire destroy the town. When the fire did come he took his wife and daughter and eleven of his neighbors, Mr. James Locke, and his wife Eva (Bursell) Locke and their five children; Hattie 7, Ruth 6, Myra 4, Thomas 1 1/2 and James 6 weeks and Mrs. David Bryden and her two children (Dave was in the woods running camp for the Shaw company) and with the help of James Locke, started poling down the channel and across the lake.
Things went well until they thought they had reached a point of safety where the wind would take them to the spot they had chosen on the north shore. But just then the fire hit the north lumber yard. One who did not witness it (your narrator did) could not imagine what a terrible thing those acres of burning dry pine lumber piles turned into. Flames shot a full thousand feet into the sky and the whole burning mass took on a rotary motion. Whole piles of blazing lumber were carried high into the air and the suction of the whirling mass seemed to draw everything loose toward it from hundreds of yards outside its periphery. The floating boat house was caught in this suction and drawn to the burning yard, whirling as it went like a spinning top.
The boathouse/log float's occupants took to small boats all except Frank Hales Kliss who was burned to death as he stood with a pike pole trying to hold the float against that terrible suction. A great tongue of flame from the yard reached out and took him just as one would snuff out a mosquito with a candle. Those in the boats fared a little better. The suction of the fire caused waves on the lake from six to eight feet high. And the boats were swamped before they had traveled a third of the distance across the lake. James Locke and his entire family were drowned. Mrs. Bryden and her two children suffer the same fate, as did also the little Kliss girl, Myrtle. Mrs. Mary M. (Locke) Kliss hung to the keel of an overturned boat until rescued by a man (James I. Kenyon) who fortunately had succeeded in getting his family across the lake before the lumber yard had turned into a whirling inferno. She was so badly burned about the head and face that she lost her eyesight a short time afterwards.
(Mary moved in with Frank's family, and eventually married Frank's half brother, Robert Rudolph Kliss. They both are buried in Oshkosh)
Married Frank Hales Kliss about 1888. She was born June 4, 1866 in Sanilac County, MI and died October 28, 1946 in Oshkosh, WI.
(Excerpted from "Phillips Destroyed By Fire in 1894, The Phillips Fire" by I.A. "Moose" Kenyon Mellen,Wis., August 16, 1942. Copyright has not been renewed, expired Aug. 16, 1970)
The loss of thirteen lives occurred among those who sought safety by crossing to the north shore of the lower lake. Frank Hales Kliss owned a large boat house that was built on a log float and anchored just below the box factory bridge. When fire threatened the day previous he had stocked the boat house with provisions for an emergency with the intention of poling the house, and float across the lake to a place of safety should the fire destroy the town. When the fire did come he took his wife and daughter and eleven of his neighbors, Mr. James Locke, and his wife Eva (Bursell) Locke and their five children; Hattie 7, Ruth 6, Myra 4, Thomas 1 1/2 and James 6 weeks and Mrs. David Bryden and her two children (Dave was in the woods running camp for the Shaw company) and with the help of James Locke, started poling down the channel and across the lake.
Things went well until they thought they had reached a point of safety where the wind would take them to the spot they had chosen on the north shore. But just then the fire hit the north lumber yard. One who did not witness it (your narrator did) could not imagine what a terrible thing those acres of burning dry pine lumber piles turned into. Flames shot a full thousand feet into the sky and the whole burning mass took on a rotary motion. Whole piles of blazing lumber were carried high into the air and the suction of the whirling mass seemed to draw everything loose toward it from hundreds of yards outside its periphery. The floating boat house was caught in this suction and drawn to the burning yard, whirling as it went like a spinning top.
The boathouse/log float's occupants took to small boats all except Frank Hales Kliss who was burned to death as he stood with a pike pole trying to hold the float against that terrible suction. A great tongue of flame from the yard reached out and took him just as one would snuff out a mosquito with a candle. Those in the boats fared a little better. The suction of the fire caused waves on the lake from six to eight feet high. And the boats were swamped before they had traveled a third of the distance across the lake. James Locke and his entire family were drowned. Mrs. Bryden and her two children suffer the same fate, as did also the little Kliss girl, Myrtle. Mrs. Mary M. (Locke) Kliss hung to the keel of an overturned boat until rescued by a man (James I. Kenyon) who fortunately had succeeded in getting his family across the lake before the lumber yard had turned into a whirling inferno. She was so badly burned about the head and face that she lost her eyesight a short time afterwards.
(Mary moved in with Frank's family, and eventually married Frank's half brother, Robert Rudolph Kliss. They both are buried in Oshkosh)
(Excerpted from "Phillips Destroyed By Fire in 1894, The Phillips Fire" by I.A. "Moose" Kenyon Mellen,Wis., August 16, 1942. Copyright has not been renewed, expired Aug. 16, 1970)
The loss of thirteen lives occurred among those who sought safety by crossing to the north shore of the lower lake. Frank Hales Kliss owned a large boat house that was built on a log float and anchored just below the box factory bridge. When fire threatened the day previous he had stocked the boat house with provisions for an emergency with the intention of poling the house, and float across the lake to a place of safety should the fire destroy the town. When the fire did come he took his wife and daughter and eleven of his neighbors, Mr. James Locke, and his wife Eva (Bursell) Locke and their five children; Hattie 7, Ruth 6, Myra 4, Thomas 1 1/2 and James 6 weeks and Mrs. David Bryden and her two children (Dave was in the woods running camp for the Shaw company) and with the help of James Locke, started poling down the channel and across the lake.
Things went well until they thought they had reached a point of safety where the wind would take them to the spot they had chosen on the north shore. But just then the fire hit the north lumber yard. One who did not witness it (your narrator did) could not imagine what a terrible thing those acres of burning dry pine lumber piles turned into. Flames shot a full thousand feet into the sky and the whole burning mass took on a rotary motion. Whole piles of blazing lumber were carried high into the air and the suction of the whirling mass seemed to draw everything loose toward it from hundreds of yards outside its periphery. The floating boat house was caught in this suction and drawn to the burning yard, whirling as it went like a spinning top.
The boathouse/log float's occupants took to small boats all except Frank Hales Kliss who was burned to death as he stood with a pike pole trying to hold the float against that terrible suction. A great tongue of flame from the yard reached out and took him just as one would snuff out a mosquito with a candle. Those in the boats fared a little better. The suction of the fire caused waves on the lake from six to eight feet high. And the boats were swamped before they had traveled a third of the distance across the lake. James Locke and his entire family were drowned. Mrs. Bryden and her two children suffer the same fate, as did also the little Kliss girl, Myrtle. Mrs. Mary M. (Locke) Kliss hung to the keel of an overturned boat until rescued by a man (James I. Kenyon) who fortunately had succeeded in getting his family across the lake before the lumber yard had turned into a whirling inferno. She was so badly burned about the head and face that she lost her eyesight a short time afterwards.
(Mary moved in with Frank's family, and eventually married Frank's half brother, Robert Rudolph Kliss. They both are buried in Oshkosh)
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