60th Anniversary of the Our Lady of the Angels Fire--Part 1: December 1, 1958

From the November 28, 2018, Hi-Liter newspaper  "Remembering the students of Our Lady of the Angels school fire" by Sandra Landen Machaj.

For students at Our Lady of the Angels Catholic Grade School, Dec. 1, 1958, began as an ordinary school day.  But for these students and their families, it would not end that way.  It would be a day that changed their lives in ways that would never be forgotten.

For it was on that day that a fire broke out in the school and took the lives of 92 students and three of the nuns that taught them.  The fire with its large number of deaths was the worst school fire ever in Illinois and the third worst school fire in the nation.

In 1958, Our Lady of the Angels was one of the largest parishes in the Archdiocese of Chicago.  The parish consisted of about 4,500 families, many of whom sent multiple children to the parish kindergarten through eighth grade school.

The school had an enrollment of approximately 1,600 students.  Located at 909 N. Avers in the Humboldt Park section of Chicago, the community at that time was a melting pot of Italian, Polish and Irish families, most of whom had lived here for several generations.