100 years ago today in Spokane: Woman using gasoline to wash clothes suffers burns

People were still learning — the hard way — about the dangers of gasoline.

Mrs. A.E. Murray, the principal of Columbia School, was on her daughter’s back porch, cleaning a “silk waist” (vest) with gasoline.

When she rubbed vigorously on the garment, the friction ignited the gasoline, which exploded.

Flames leaped around her head and singed her hair. She suffered severe burns on her hands and arms. The porch and house roof caught fire, seriously damaging the upper part of the house.

Mrs. Murray was taken to the hospital where she was reported to be “resting easily.” She was fortunate not to have any serious burns on her head and face.

From the superstition file: Abe Rykus, a Spokane “transfer man” (i.e., baggage handler), refused to take a city license numbered “13” when it was offered to him by the mayor. Instead, he asked for, and received, license No. 43.

“Personally have no fear of No. 13,” said Rykus, “but I know my customers will object to having their baggage handled in a wagon with a Jonah number. I missed 13 (meaning, the 13th of the month) by one day when I was born. I have five kids and they got on either side of it. So long as I have escaped 13 this far, there is no use in my taking chances now.”

Evidently, he was not the only transfer man with a prejudice against No. 13. That license “has reposed in the city files without a taker for months,” said the paper.