NOTABLE CONFLAGRATIONS IN THE WORLD'S HISTORY. From "The Insurance Year Book," published by "The Spectator Company." Even before man began to congregate and build cities, there existed the danger of prairie and forest fires; but these, except in a minor way, were not especially destructive of other property. When cities had been built and many thousands of people came to be housed within a small area, the danger of fire and its capacity for doing harm to men and their property were greatly augmented; and as cities increased in size, the fire hazard and the accumulated values subject to destruction were both correspondingly multiplied. During the last four thousand years many cities have been swept by fire, some of them several times; and some have been practically obliterated. Below will be found a list, compiled from various sources, of some of the more important fires of history, comprising those most notable because of the values or lives destroyed, or for some peculiar reason: FIRES, URBAN AND RURAL, IN THE UNITED STATES: NUMBER, BUILDINGS, AND LOSS PER CAPITA, [Source: Report of the Geological Survey, Department of the Interior.] FIRES IN THE UNITED STATES: POPULATION, LOSS AND PER CAPITA LOSS, BY GEOGRAPHIC DIVISIONS, CALENDAR YEAR 1907. [Source: Report of the Geological Survey, Department of the Interior.] ANNUAL FIRE LOSSES IN THE UNITED STATES FOR THIRTY-SEVEN YEARS rents, The combined aggregates of the Financial Standing, etc., of the 214 principal insurance companies show that the capital stock in 1910 was $40,544,728. The principal sources of income of these companies for the same period were as follows: New premiums, $70,180,419; renewed premiums, $517,535,978; received for annuities, $5,671,844; dividends, interest, etc., $160,513,917; received for $10,309,988; and all other receipts, $16,799,103; thus making the total income $781,011,249. The expenditures of these same companies for the same period were as follows: Paid for death losses, $180,654,396; paid for matured endowments, $46,349,075; annuities paid, $7,426,499; paid for surrendered, lapsed and purchased policies, $77,518,465; dividends to policyholders, $75,355,638; dividends to stockholders, $2,140,037; commissions, salaries and traveling expenses of agents, $87,628,519; medical fees, salaries and other charges of employees, $26,036,575; and all other expenditures, $37,235,222; thus making the total expenditures of the companies $540,342,426. The excess of the income over the expenditures for the year 1910 amounted to $240,668,823. At the end of the calendar year 1910 there were 5,937 Building and Loan Associations in the United States having assets to the sum of $945,568,907 and a membership of 2,216,912. The assets, amounting to $3,875,877,059 of admitted assets and $25,185,764 of assets not admitted, were divided as follows: Real estate owned, $172,960,857; bond and mortgage loans, $1,227,231,592; bonds owned, $1,659,845,447; stocks owned, $129,622,493; collateral loans, $18,941,120; premium notes and loans, $495,099,854; cash in office and banks, $71,112,566; net deferred and unpaid premiums, $50,955,665; and all other assets, $50,107,465. The liabilities of these same companies, amounting to $3,385,821,478, were divided as follows: Reserve, $3,225,966,060; losses and claims not paid, $17,072,212; claims resisted, $1,779,117; dividends unpaid, $79,990,050; and all other liabilities, $61,014,039. The total surplus paid to policyholders amounted to $490,055,571. The policy account of these companies is as follows: New business actually paid for, $1,822,260,287; whole life policies in force, $8,816,663,388; endowment policies in force, $3,042,585,983; and all other policies in force, $1,367,963,797. The total insurance in force in these companies amounted to $13,227,213,168; the industrial business written to $734,793,180; and the industrial insurance in force to $3,177,047,874. Spectator Insurance Year Book. The first steam fire engine was invented by Braithwaite, 1829; Ericsson, in New York, produced a similar one in 1840. They were not generally used until 1860. Fire engines driven by motor power first used in 1905. |