HARTFORD, Conn. — For many, childhood memories of the circus bring a smile, but for the survivors of a fire 80 years ago in Hartford, just the word circus triggers pain.
“I’ve tried to block it out as much as possible,” Peter Bortolan said. “But sometimes a dream at night will kick back up that the image of that tent burning. You can’t imagine what that tent looked like when it was on fire.”
Peter Bortolan was almost seven years old when he and his parents went to Barbour Street to see the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey traveling show. It was 15 minutes in when the circus erupted into chaos.
“Suddenly there was a yell from somebody: Fire! and I look back over my shoulder and saw the flames starting to go up the tent,” he said. “I looked at it and my father said, let's get out of here!”
Thankfully for Peter, he sat near the Big Top’s entrance and was one of the first ones out. Melvin Christensen was also there.
“It sounded like a roar like, real hard wind,” Christensen said. “We all turned around soon as we heard the roar, and it was coming right up the tent.”
Eight years old at the time, he went to the circus with two adults and four other children. But as the crowd panicked from the smoke and flames, the group became separated.
“They went running and I was left alone and so I was running around and I didn’t know what to do,” he said.
He followed a man who pulled out a knife and sliced part of the tent to escape.
“Once I got outside, I just ran,” Christensen said. “I ran all the way up to where the road was and crossed the road. And I got to the other side, and I just started crying.”
Mel eventually reunited with his family, all of them made it out. But for so many others, they were less lucky.
“Initially, the firefighters didn't believe they were any people killed at all,” Charles Teale, retired Hartford Fire Chief, said. “Someone simply said did you see all of those animals that were killed. And other person said those weren't animals they're mannequins and they came to find out or they were people.”
People were burned alive as they raced for the exits, some of them blocked by animal chutes and other obstacles. Because many men were all fighting in World War II at the time, most of the victims are grandparents, women, and children: the youngest just a few months old.
“Several days later, we found out that neighbors who had lived across the street from us had died in the fire and that two people who had who lived behind us had been burned,” Bortolan said.
The names of the 168 victims are carved into a bronze memorial on the very site of where the circus tents stood on July 6, 1944, the present day site of the former Fred Wish School on Barbour Street. More than 700 others were injured.
“We were so lucky and I felt so bad for everybody else got killed in a in a fire,” Christensen said. “People lost family members and stuff like that. For years they probably suffered.”
They suffered from what many first responders, including retired Hartford Fire Chief Charles Teale, describe as a preventable tragedy.
“Well-trained, well-equipped firefighters could have put that fire out when it was on the sidewalk,” Teale said.
But by the time firefighters got there, it was too late.
“There were several things that went wrong,” Teale said. “The tent itself, it was treated with wax thinned with gasoline,” Teale said.
1,800 pounds of paraffin wax and 6,000 gallons of gasoline used to waterproof the tent, a practice that's now illegal. Another problem: there weren't any fire extinguishers readily available. And then, there were the folding chairs that stacked up and tripped people as they ran for their lives.
“So you've got no visibility or limited visibility at best. And you've got these loose chairs that are falling and in your way as you're trying to get out. Obviously, it was a recipe for disaster,” Teale said.
Investigations into the fire resulted in five circus official serving prison time for involuntary manslaughter. But they weren't the only ones at fault.
“(Investigators) came back and they said that the police chief, the fire chief and the fire marshal, were all partly responsible for the outcome of the fire,” Teale said.
Responsible, in part, for never even inspecting the tent nor having fire personnel on site.
“What is the number one responsibility of the municipality? The protection of the citizens. That's number one. I understand that other things are important. But number one is the protection of the citizens. Were they protected? No,” Teale said.
But Teale said Hartford has learned from mistakes of the past by improving fire codes and creating a model for other states to follow.
“There were several things that did change for the better,” Teale said, “the materials used in construction was one thing. Lighting is another thing. seating arrangement is another thing on site person personnel in case there is an emergency.”
As agencies strive to avoid another circus catastrophe, those who lived through the one of 1944 continue to fight the emotional battle.
“I was afraid to go in buildings and things,” Christensen said.
“I don't like crowds,” Bortolan said. “I don't like crowds.”
The Circus Fire remains a piece of Hartford history that continues to haunt survivors 80 years later.
“How do you get over something like that?” Bortolan asked, fighting back tears. “I think it's willpower. I think you just have to decide that you got to put it behind (you) or it will eat you alive.”
An investigation concluded that a flicked cigarette started that fire, but others have challenged that theory. They point to a convicted arsonist who worked on the Hartford Circus lighting crew and allegedly confessed responsibility before recanting his statement.
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