I told them that I would not
sell at any price, as I was satisfied and intended to remain there
as long as I lived. On the morning of the sixth of June, 1889, my
clerk came to my room and woke me up, saying that there was a fire
in the northern part of town and that the wind was blowing strong
from that direction. I dressed at once, and when I got out on the
street I could see the fire about a half mile from my property,
but had not the faintest idea that it would ever reach me,
although the excitement was running high on the street. I returned
to the hotel, washed, and was just eating my breakfast when one of
the waiters came and told me that he could see the fire from the
door. I told him he must be mistaken, but he went and looked again
and came back and told me that the fire was getting very close. I
ran to the door and saw that it was then within one block of my
hotel. Now I saw that my property was sure to be burnt, so I sent
my clerk up stairs to see whether or not there were any lodgers in
the rooms, and I made a rush for the safe and only just had time
to get it unlocked and the contents out when the fire was on us.
That fire wiped me out slick and clean as I did not have a
dollar's worth of insurance on the property. Any business man
would have known enough at least to have a few thousand dollars of
insurance on that amount of property, but I had never seen a fire
before in a city and thought it folly to insure, and did not find
out my mistake until it was too late.
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