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City Council Agenda
Howe Messenger, Nov. 3, 1939
Five Students Hurt as Science Room Wrecked
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TWENTY-FIVE STUDENTS AND TEACHER SCATTERED AS BLAST COMES
Jack Calloway, the most seriously injured of the five students was returned to the hospital Wednesday morning where he is being fed through his nose. His condition was reported showing improvement as we went to press. The other four injured are rapidly recovering.
Twenty-five members of the Howe freshman class miraculously escaped death or serious injury about 9:30 Tuesday morning when a gas explosion rocked the science room in the northeast corner of the school building. Jack Calloway was the most seriously injured suffering a fractured chin, dislocated jaw and cuts and bruises. Three others, Mary Jane Boozer, Hanzel Smith and John Robert Coleman received cuts and bruises about the face and Charles Rose was cut on the legs.
Calloway, Smith and Coleman were taken to Sherman for treatment, X-rays being made of Calloway’s injuries. They were returned to their homes about noon. The Boozer girl and Rose were given treatment by Howe physicians. The room in which the students were assembled was a shambles with chairs, tables and laboratory equipment scattered all over the floor. All windows on the north side were blown out, even the frames being splintered by the blast. The floor was buckled in the center of the room and an built-in cabinet along the east wall was badly wrecked. The south wall, a plaster partition was blown outward, the top being seven or eight inches out of line. The explosion evidently raised the ceiling off this wall before it was pushed out as nails from ceiling joists were not bent by the movement of the wall. More than half of the composition paneled ceiling fell to the floor. The door NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN THAT A REGULAR MEETING OF THE GOVERNING BODY OF THE CITY OF HOWE, TEXAS WILL BE HELD ON THE 19th day of May 2020, AT 6:00 P.M., AT 700 W. HANING, HOWE, TEXAS AT WHICH TIME THE FOLLOWING SUBJECTS WILL BE DISCUSSED, TO WIT: CALL TO ORDER PUBLIC REQUEST – At this time comments will be taken from the audience on any subject whether or not that item is on the agenda. All comments are limited to a maximum of three minutes. In accordance with the Open Meetings Act, Council may not discuss or act on any of the items not posted on the agenda. CONSENT AGENDA Consider/approve consent items which are marked by an *. * Minutes of April 21, 2020 * Finance statements -April 2020 * City of Sherman Resolution & Law Enforcement ILA 1. Discuss, consider and act upon consent agenda.
2. Swear in General Election Council members, incumbent Georgia Richardson, and new Council Members, Brett Bearden, and Robert Cannaday.
3. Swear in Bill French as Mayor and Council Member Jeff Stanley for the unexpired terms.
ADJOURN Notes to agenda: The Council may vote and/or act upon each of the items listed in the Agenda. The Council reserves the right to retire into executive session concerning any of the items listed on this Agenda, whenever it is considered necessary and legally justified under the Open Meetings Act, Chapter 551, Government Code Vernon’s Texas Codes Annotated in accordance with the authority contained in Section 551.071 – Consultation with attorney, Section 551.072 – Deliberation regarding real property, Section 551.073 – Deliberation regarding prospective gift, Section 551.074 –Personnel, Section 551.076 – Deliberation regarding security devices, and Section 551.087 – Deliberation regarding economic development negotiations. Dated this 15th day of May 2020
leading into the hall was blown from the hinges.
Students seated in the rear of the room stated that the blast came without warning and that those in the front of the room including the teacher, Chas. R. Thompson, were thrown to the ceiling, together with tables and chairs. There was no flash of fire reported.
A desk and safe in the principal’s office, just west of the room in which the blast occurred, were shifted about and a typewriter was hurled from the top of the desk to the floor and broken. The door of the safe was opened by the concussion.
The commercial room in the northwest corner of the building was also damaged, the floor buckled upward in the center, several window paned were broken out and the south partition wall slightly forced outward. Typewriters were thrown to the floor and desks overturned and all but one or two of the machines were broken. No one was in this room at the time of the explosion.
One class had already been held in the science room and the second had been in progress about ten minutes. W.B. Montgomery was in charge of the first class and stated that the odor of gas was noticed and that he ordered the windows raised. A fire had been burning in the room heater since early in the morning, Chas. Sollis, building caretaker said. The heaters are a radiant type.
An investigation to determine cause of the gas accumulation under the floor was started immediately and a break was found in the gas line feeding this room. The break in the line was outside the building, the leaking gas sifting through cracks in the ground caused by extremely dry weather. The leak was small, a meter reading showing that only 23,000 feet of gas including that burned by about 20 stoves, had gone into the building lines since the last meter reading on October
