Gasoline was once commonly used as a household cleaner, which turned out to be a pretty bad idea for countless people who burned to death while scrubbing away at home.
One dubious estimate suggested that cleaning with gasoline led to 25,000 deaths annually in North America.
That's implausible because -assuming they mean the States and Canada - by ballpark proportion, that means 600 would be dying per year in Quebec and about 300 in Montreal.
But some did suffer hellish deaths by fire due to their improper use of gasoline.
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| 3216 Jarry E. |
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| Greco |
1- TOP MONTREAL MOBSTER CLAIMED BY FLAMES Louis Greco, who ran the local mob alongside partner Vic Cotroni, was employing a flammable solvent while laying tile at his brother Tony's Gina's Pizzeria at
3212 Jarry E. when it caught and he was bunted to death on Dec. 3, 1972.
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| 3493 Hutchison |
2-
YOUNG LOVERS KILLED BY GASOLINE Steve Horvath, 32, and Theresa Jekkel, 26, were killed in a blast at
3493 Hutchison. They were fixing up the apartment that they were to share as a wed couple until a five gallon tub of gasoline they were using to clean, left in the bathtub, exploded on Sept. 29 1957.
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| St. Dominique |
3-
BICYCLE CLEANING RITUAL KILLS PAIR Geraldine Methot, 47 and Richard Garand, in his late 30s died when gasoline, employed to clean bicycles
caught fire at 5
760 St. Dominique on June 2, 1974. Methot's son Serge Methot, 25, also caught fire but managed to put the flames out by running outside and rubbing on a brick wall. Methot had purchased $1 worth of gasoline and carried it home in a stryrofoam cooler and it leaked into the floor and set the kitchen on fire. The rooming house was later demolished. The gas was being used to clean bicycles and was lit by a gas pilot on the hot water tank or the gas stove where spaghetti sauce was on the oven.
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| 7632 Drolet |
3-
BED CLEANING LEADS TO FIERY DEATH A Mrs. Miron was set ablaze while using gasoline to clean a bed at 9 p.m. on a Saturday night in 1937 at
7632 Drolet, A neighbour who happened to be a fireman rushed to help her by wrapping her in a blanket. She died nonetheless.
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| 5573 3rd Ave. |
Some non-fatal accidents
1-Berthe Lacquerre, 21, suffered serious burns cleaning her dress with gasoline at
5573 Third Ave. Rosemont in 1930. She was wearing one of the dresses at the time and put the fire out by rolling around in the snow.
2-A young woman caused
$500 in damages - quite a lot in 1923 terms - when she triggered a fire and automatic sprinklers while cleaning grease spots from her dress on St. James St.
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By 1948 authorities were still urging people to "be careful" when cleaning with gasoline. By 1952 they were recommending people simply not do it at all.
Gosh, I was around to remember all of these cases. It taught us real quick to get rid of gasoline for difficult cleaning jobs. I think that’s when I learned about Varsol ???
ReplyDeleteProbably even more hazardous is the use of cigarette lighter fluid as a cleaning product due to the handy, small compact size of their containers.
ReplyDeleteFamiliar brands such as Auer, Fisher, Ronsonol, and Zippo were never meant to be used as a substitute for other, safer cleaning products.
Incidents of often tragic accidents can be found. See, for example, the Gainesville Sun of May 12, 1984, page 8A, column 5, "Lighter Fluid on Rag Starts Fire...".
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1320&dat=19840512&id=7UQRAAAAIBAJ&sjid=l-kDAAAAIBAJ&pg=4644,3344246
Of course, people have always tended to ignore warnings against bad habits and practices.
See this article in the Montreal Gazette of July 21, 1908, page 7, column 3, "Poison in Tobacco Smoke" outlining the dangers of carbon monoxide to the human body. One wonders how many smokers--and even doctors--paid any serious attention to these studies of long ago!
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=Fr8DH2VBP9sC&dat=19080721&printsec=frontpage&hl=en
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Couldn't help but notice (with a laugh) the adjacent article, "New Water Mains", "Work Urgently Needed", on column 1 of the same page of that 1908 Gazette concerning the inadequacy of many of the city's underground pipes!
Not much seems to have changed in over 100 years! Did no one consider that larger diameter pipes would inevitably be needed as the population and water usage increased?