in the intense heat of the fire. Another possible source of the odor was the burning shaft timbers, chemically treated to withstand moisture.
On the night the fire began, 415 men were at work underground in the North Butte’s Granite Mountain and Speculator mines. They were widely dispersed, laboring in pairs or small clusters in hundreds of locations throughout the workings. Fifty-seven men were at work in the upper parts of the mines—between the 400- and 800-foot levels. Most of the rest worked deep in the ground—between 1,700 and 3,000 feet below the surface.4
Ernest Sullau grasped quickly that the fire put hundreds of men at risk, though he might not have imagined the scope or speed of the danger. As we know, the fire broke out at 11:45 P.M., driving Sullau and his companions from the 2,400 Station within minutes. By midnight, rising smoke was visible at the Granite Mountain collar.
Smoke and gas also spread rapidly from Granite Mountain across to the Speculator through the multiple crosscuts.5 So rapidly did the fumes travel that by 12:10 A.M.—only twenty-five minutes after the start of the fire—smoke began to rise from the collar of the Spec. By 1:00 A.M., gases had spread to adjoining mines owned by the Anaconda Copper Mining Company, including the Badger, the Diamond, and the High Ore.6
As the miners initially encountered smoke, most thought it was dust from drilling or smoke from blasting, both commonplace in the mines. Indeed, the North Butte mines exploded more than 1,700 pounds of dynamite every day.7“My partner was at the machine when we noticed what appeared to us to have been an unusual amount of dust,” said a survivor named Jack Watts. His partner started to oil the machine “when a boy from the 2,200-foot level rushed to [us] asking us if we saw any smoke. By this time we were all coughing.”8
In many parts of the mine, the smoke and gas were accompanied by a wave of scorching heat from the inferno of the Granite Mountain shaft. Victims hundreds of feet from any flames were found with their faces singed.9 So intense was the heat generated in the Granite Mountain shaft that it warped the steel cages in the Speculator shaft—800 feet away. According to one report, twelve men were killed in the Speculator when the heat from Granite Mountain snapped “clean” the cable to their cage. The cable was pulled to the surface, leaving the cage and its victims lodged at the 2,200-level of the shaft.10
What we know about the movements of Ernest Sullau after the start of the fire comes from stories told by survivors, many of whom owed him their lives. Having decided against the quick flight from the mine that would have saved his own life, Sullau set about warning his fellow miners of the calamity that he himself had unleashed.
By midnight, all electric lines to Granite Mountain had been burned out. Even if there had been power, Sullau knew that there was no alarm system in place to warn miners of a fire or any other danger. In later years, Butte mines used the air supply itself as an alarm system. In the event of an emergency, a noxious odor was added to the oxygen that was pumped from the surface into the mines—similar to the scent added today to propane or natural gas. When miners smelled this odor, they knew to evacuate.11 In 1917, though, the Butte miners could depend only on one another. Their safety hung by a fragile, human chain.
It appears most likely that Sullau initially climbed down from the 2,400 Station. His intention was probably to descend as low as possible, then work his way back up toward the surface, warning as many men as he could find.
One early sighting of Sullau comes from the 2,600. To move between levels, it is important to note, Sullau had to climb. The typical route would have been through a manway, climbing on a rickety wooden ladder. To move from the 2,400 level to the 2,600 was the equivalent of climbing down a twenty-story ladder (assuming ten feet as the equivalent of one story). For his only source of light, Sullau gripped the same carbide lantern that spawned the fire. And of course throughout all of his movements after the outbreak of the fire, Sullau traversed through smoke and increasingly dangerous levels of gas.
On the 2,600 level, approximately 600 feet from the Granite Mountain shaft, a young Eastern European emigrant named Mike Jovitich was eating supper with fifteen other men when he felt a strange sensation in his nose. Soon after came a cry of “fire” and the miners, “as if one man,” ran in the direction of the Granite Mountain shaft. “I am young and had been in the mine only three weeks,” said Jovitich. “So I followed like a sheep would.”12
Dozens of miners made the same mistake that night—running toward Granite Mountain and the very maw of the fire, “whereas any other direction would have been safer.”13 Their choice of direction, though wrong, was not irrational. Just two months before, in April 1917, fire had broken out in an adjoining, Anaconda-owned mine called the Modoc. The Modoc fire was still burning on June 9. In fact, in two incidents since April, fumes from the Modoc had infiltrated the North Butte property. Both times, miners fled toward the Granite Mountain shaft, where they were lifted to safety. In the early morning hours of June 9, many miners probably believed that the smoke came from the Modoc and ran toward Granite Mountain—the same path that had led them to safety before.14
There was another reason for the men to seek safety via Granite Mountain. On the day the fire broke out (and apparently for a few days before), the Speculator shaft had been under repair.15 The Spec suffered recurrent problems with shifting ground, which frequently pushed the shaft timbers inward to such a degree that the cage could not pass. When this happened, the shaft had to be closed temporarily while crews shaved back the timbers to create enough space for the cages.16 In the emergency circumstances of the Granite Mountain fire, rescuers would press the Spec hoists into service to assist rescue efforts. But on the day of the fire, the men working in the Speculator were lowered via the Granite Mountain shaft.17 Thus, it would have been natural for them to believe that their best exit—perhaps their only exit—lay through Granite Mountain.
Whatever the reasoning that led miners to run toward Granite Mountain, the consequences were usually deadly. According to the Bureau of Mines Accident Report, for example, it appears that “at least a dozen” men died on the 1,800 level when they ran toward Granite Mountain. Some of them probably ran directly past a connection to the adjoining Badger mine that would have led them to safety.18 Most would have had no way of knowing.
Like the young Eastern European Mike Jovitich, eating his supper on the 2,600, many Butte miners were new to the job. The estimate of monthly turnover in the mines was a remarkable 20 to 45 percent.19 In 1917, open positions were usually filled from the wave of Eastern Europeans who washed into Butte’s train station each week, many coming directly from the Old Country after quick transit through Ellis Island. Most were illiterate and spoke little or no English.
Even if the men had been able to read, there were few signs in the mines to label directions. One of the recommendations of the accident report, seemingly basic, was that signboards “be erected to show direction to exits to other mines, to the manways which are in condition for travel, and to the main shafts.”20 The requirement for signage marking escape routes had actually been a part of state law since at least 1897, a fact the accident report fails to note.21 It was only after the fire, according to one survivor, that “they placed signs around to tell men which way to go.”22
As Mike Jovitich and his fifteen companions dashed toward the Granite Mountain shaft, they ran into Ernest Sullau, an encounter that saved their lives. Sullau stopped them and turned them around, telling them about the source of the fire and directing them toward the Speculator shaft. Jovitich and the others ran for the Spec, while Sullau continued his search for more miners to warn.23
Even with the benefit of running in the right direction, the Jovitich crew was swimming in gas by the time they made it to the 2,600 Station of the Speculator shaft. They climbed 200 feet up ladders to the 2,400 level “and
