Identity elements
Reference code
Name and location of repository
Level of description
Item
Title
777-1
Date(s)
- 1934-06-27 (Creation)
Extent
Name of creator
Content and structure elements
Scope and content
Two massive explosions at the Denn Powder Co. dynamite plant eight miles northeast of Olympia, on June 27, 1934, killed ten people outright and injured six. Packing room employee O.R. Mitchell displays a damaged time clock with its hands stopped at 3:55, the time of the blasts. Night shift employees normally began work at 4 pm; on June 27th, however, they had started work an hour earlier. Mr. Mitchell was among those scheduled to leave at 4pm but instead left at 3. He was at home when he heard a tremendous explosion and saw a peculiar gray cloud. Rushing back to the plant, he saw many bodies. The loss of life may have been lessened because both crews were not at work at the same time. Many of the deaths and injuries may have occurred when workers, attempting to put out fires caused by the first explosion, were then caught in the second blast. (T. Times, 6-28-34, p. 1, 9)
Disasters--Hawks Prairie; Explosions--Hawks Prairie; H. J. Denn Powder Co. (Hawks Prairie); Mitchell, O.R.; Time clocks--Hawks Prairie;