On this day Great Fire of 1901 devastates Jacksonville

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Today marks 123 years since the Great Fire of 1901 swept through Jacksonville.

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It’s believed that sparks from cooking fires spread to a mattress factory and the fire spread. It destroyed 146 blocks of Jacksonville. That was three-quarters of all buildings in Jacksonville at the time, including city hall, the county courthouse, the state bank, and the gas works. A total of 2,300 buildings were lost.

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Seven people were reported to be killed and 10,000 were left homeless.

The effort to rebuild after the fire defined modern Jacksonville.

“To this day, the Great Fire of 1901 is the third largest fire in the history of the United States,” the City of Jacksonville said in a social media post.

To learn more about the Great Fire of 1901 the Jacksonville Public Library is a great resource. Discover maps, written accounts, and a detailed scale model showing how large the fire actually was.

Jacksonville Turns 200: The Great Fire of 1901

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