Losses by Fire Last Year

Last year, property to the value of $80,328,035 was burned, of which amount $43,031,700 was distributed by insurance. The tax we pay to fire amounts to about $10 per annum for each productive life in the country. October was the most disastrous month of the year, the losses being $12,053,095. March and September, notorious as months of turbulent winds, show the least loss, $4,095,499 and $4,105,110 respectively. Of the structures burned, hotels rank highest in number, 337 — nearly one per day. Saw mills, liquor stores, drugstores, restaurants, furniture factories, machine shops, flouring and planing mills, carpenter and blacksmith shops, churches, lumberyards, public halls, tanneries, woollen mills, newspaper offices, cotton mills, cooper shops and carriage factories follow in the order given.