BEHAVIOR OF INDIVIDUAL STRUCTURES. 91 
reported that this building was dynamited three times during the 
progress of the fire, although I was assured by a policeman, who 
claimed to have been on duty during the whole time, that this report 
was not true. Under the circumstances, it is a little difficult to draw 
a reliable conclusion from the state of affairs in the Emporium. 
However, examination of the ruins indicated very strongly that much 
of the trouble was due to the inadequacy of the fireproof protection 
to the steel work. 
PI. XXXII, A, is a general view of the collapsed portion of the 
building and illustrates the failure of the terra-cotta column covering 
in various stages. The hollow-tile end-construction arches in the 
mezzanine floor had collapsed over considerable areas, under the 
influence of heat alone, as the evidence plainly indicated that nothing 
could have been precipitated upon them and that they were not sub- 
jected to an explosion. A considerable portion of the rear wall of 
the Emporium, which had been thrown down, probably partly by 
earthquake and partly by the fire, presented one case of very excellent 
mortar used in a commercial building. The mortar was better than 
the bricks, and both were of good quality. The fireproofing in the 
lower part of the building was quite as good as that ordinarily found 
in similar structures throughout the country. In fact, it would be 
easy to point out department stores not so well fireproofed as the 
lower part of the Emporium. 
I have always been of the opinion that the Home store in Pitts- 
burg, which was the first large fireproof department store to be 
tested by fire, was really closer to collapse from the heat than is 
generally believed. After the covering has been stripped from a 
steel column, the time and heat required to bring it down are not 
very great. The fact that the covering comes off during a fire is 
absolute proof that it is wholly inadequate. If the steel column 
stands up, notwithstanding the loss of its covering, it is due to 
good luck and not at all to good fireproofing. In the Home store 
the covering was stripped from a number of columns; in the Empo- 
rium Building the same thing happened, but the heat continued a 
little longer, and there is no doubt in my mind, after an examination 
of the ruins, that at least a portion of the collapse was due to the 
failure of the columns under heat. The floor tiles in the Emporium 
Building lost their lower webs in large quantities, where the arches 
themselves did not collapse; and tiles in the column covering which 
did not come off bodily also lost (heir exposed webs in considerable 
quantities. The ruins of the Emporium were in a very dangerous 
condition, so that a detailed inspection was not practicable; and it 
is doubtful whether any useful results would have followed, because 
the fireproofing was of the ordinary commercial type which has 
often enough been proved inadequate to resist a serious lire. 
