Pine Bluff Fire of 1907

Around eight blocks of eastern Pine Bluff (Jefferson County) were consumed in a fast-moving fire on February 13, 1907.

The fire began at around 2:30 p.m. on February 13, 1907, in the home of Cotton Belt Railroad employee E. D. Brooks at the corner of Third Avenue and Kentucky Street, and “with lighting-like rapidity the flames leaped from house to house until the sixteen residences which comprised the total in that block, from Kentucky to Pennsylvania streets, appeared to be a mammoth bonfire.”

The fire spread rapidly as high winds fanned the blaze. Pine Bluff firefighters were hampered by poor water pressure in the area, which was largely populated by railroad workers. The Pine Bluff Graphic reported that “as fast as they soaked one part of a building…extinguishing a blaze here and there, another flame would shoot up. With equal suddenness the house would burst into flame as if it had been saturated with oil. Then the firemen would turn their attention to another.”

As the fire spread, residents tried to move their belongings from their houses, with some bringing them to the nearby railroad tracks “where the intense heat soon caused them to be ignited.” The disaster’s only casualty happened when Cotton Belt foreman John Springer, who was helping move furniture from a friend’s burning house, was struck and mortally injured by a railroad engine. Initial reports said that a man named Jim Reed was burned in a hotel, but he escaped, though he suffered burns.

As the conflagration approached the Cotton Belt Railroad shops, they were shut down; engines, cars, and tools were moved away, and railroad employees “were placed at work fighting the flames with the fire apparatus of the shops.” Seeing that the Cotton Belt compound and nearby Waters-Pierce Oil Company’s oil house were in peril of catching fire, officials placed dynamite, and “all of the buildings opposite the shop were blown up and the fire was stopped” at around 4:30 p.m. About an hour later, “after having burned everything in its path…the fire ceased to roar and in twenty minutes only a mass of light blue smoke and a hurrying, excited crowed of people were left to tell the tale.”

Eight blocks of Pine Bluff were consumed by the fire. Ninety houses; the Carr Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church; the Lampert, Orton, and Hanifan hotels; and 200 outbuildings were burned, as were two Cotton Belt freight cars, “fifty telephone and telegraph poles,” and “fencing valued at $5,000.” Total damages were estimated at $200,000.

While Springer was the only fatality, Reed, a man named Schnable, and a baby suffered burns. Dozens of families were left homeless, with most of their belongings consumed in the fire. The Cotton Belt railroad was later sued for $95,000 on allegations that sparks from one of its engines started the blaze, but a jury ruled in favor of the railroad “after less than an hour of deliberation.”

For additional information:
“Big Fire in the East End.” Pine Bluff Daily Graphic, February 13, 1907, p. 1.

“Nine Blocks Destroyed and Two Lives Lost in Fierce Fire at Pine Bluff.” Arkansas Gazette, February 14, 1907, p. 1.

“Pine Bluff Fire.” Fort Smith Times, February 14, 1907, p. 1.

Powell, Richard Stephen. “The Great East End Fire of 1907.” Jefferson County Historical Quarterly 53 (Spring 2025): 10–29.

“Worst Fire Ever Known Swept Pine Bluff Suburb.” Arkansas Democrat, February 14, 1907, p. 1, 7.

Mark K. Christ
Little Rock, Arkansas