The Day a Whole Town Lost Their Children: the New London School Gas Explosion
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- Опубліковано 6 лют 2025
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My grandfather was Bill Thompson and he survived this explosion. He was buried in the rubble for hours. He lived his whole life in New London and even donated part of the property where the museum is today. All of his children attended the school there in new London. This is one of the best videos on this incident I have ever seen. You did a fine job! Thank you for keeping this story alive.
My first job as a pharmacist was with a man named Scott Thompson. He was Bill Thompson's son. Scott told me all the stories that his dad experienced (swapping seats with Ethyl Dorsey before she was killed by the blast and living with deep guilt). I so badly wanted to meet him and tell him that it was not his fault Ethyl had died. l hope he finally found peace.
Both my father's parents and two aunts survived it.
@@dav214rx he did find peace. Thank you so much for your kind words. And my uncle Scott was a great man. Unfortunately he passed away before his father. We all miss them both so much.
My dad told us a story about a man that could only identify his daughter by a bandaid over a cut on her knee that he'd dressed for her that morning. It was all so sad. The museum has a teacher's desk in tact with a roll book and checks by names. It's said that book helped know what kids were in her class that day.
Last time I was at the museum, the log book was showing my youngest aunt in attendance that day. I’ve also seen mention of others of my immediate family in the exhibits.
How heart braking 😢
I live in Fort Worth, TX. A few months ago, my son and I smelled gas in our house and immediately called the gas company. They found a slow gas leak underneath our street! I am feeling grateful that our lives and the lives of our neighbors may have been saved by the malodorous additive! I didn't know this history until now, and I'm grateful for the changes that his horrible tragedy brought about. Love this channel, Georgia.♥️
I live relight next to a natural gas line. We always call when there’s a bad smell outside that definitely isn’t the chicken houses up the road.
Glad all y’all are safe.
I once smelled a gas leak on my street, around 25 years ago. Thankfully, the cops and gas company workers showed up very quickly.
Thank you for your respectful treatment of this tragic event. My husband's mother [a baby at the time] lost her eldest sister and brother in this tragedy. Another sister, thrown through the air by the force of the blast, required mobility assistance from that day forward. It's not something his mom ever discusses and the only way I knew about it was one day I said something to him about the awful smell of natural gas. I got a mini history lesson about why and then did research on the matter. What life was like in her household after that day doesn't bear imagining.
😢😢😢😢😢😢omg so so sorry for all families who loss a love one or love ones on that fatal day! 🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽
I felt my throat closing up at the thought of that little girl, horribly injured, trying to cover herself. I just cannot fathom the images that must be burned into the minds of the survivors. It would've been an apocalyptic scene, the kind of devastation you associate with war.
The image of those kids being excited to go home at the end of the school day and them never going home again just breaks my heart
Tell you the honest truth I always imagined disasters like this happening that would prevent me from coming home on time like getting in a wreck or school getting attacked or lock down literally I hated school that much I didn't want to get stuck in that position at school or on the bus the worse that ever happened was the fake school bomb threats that happened almost once or twice a week not kidding till they finally made it a federal offense and not just expelled but thrown in jail not juvie and this was back in 2006-2007 years they also used cameras to catch those going in and out of the bathroom for time stamp of before the note was found one girl said the person who wrote one of the notes tried to pin it on her but she proved she didn't write the note as the note was not her handwriting
My mother and her parents survived the Texas City Disaster. My grandmother was severely traumatized by it - she spoke of it often for the rest of her life.
😢😢😢😢😢😢😢🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽
Today marks the 86th anniversary of this horrific tragedy. It always seems like a tragedy has to happen for laws or inventions to be made to prevent this from happening again. This is so sad.
EDIT: It also seems like corners were cut to save money which is always a direct link to a tragedy happening.
My uncle was killed. My mom, Aunt and Uncle were part of the group that started the reunions.
😢😢😢😢😢😢🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽
My father had siblings in school that there. His future sister in law and her twin brother were there; she was injured, the brother died of his injuries. My dad’s siblings who were there, were only slightly injured. My dad had dropped out the previous autumn to work full time.
I’ve been trying to get a gas safe plumber to do some work for me to no avail. One chap that was recommended to me was very keen though. When I asked him if he was gas safe he said yes you can look me up then didn’t turn up. No wonder he was keen I believe he realised that I would look him up and guess what, yes he was not registered. It’s scary to think what could have happened.
The recounts that you read really made it hit the Heart.
I’ve only ever watched one other creator’s video on this event. It’s absolutely brutal and I cannot imagine the longterm trauma effects it had on the survivors, relatives and helpers.
I think I first heard about this story from reading about other mass tragedies. I read the Texas Monthly article which was very good. I also read the book Gone at 3:17 about this tragedy. It was a difficult read but it was a good book. There were parents who lost all of their children in the explosion. There is one story of a woman who let her youngest son tag along to the high school with his big brother. The younger one didn't attend the school . She lost both boys that day.
I read a good book about this disaster it's a shame that many of the people of New London scapegoated the principal. When nearly all of them were guilty of siphoning off natural gas
I'm amazed you've gotten so many requests! It seems so unknown. West Rusk (where the New London school was) is my school, so this story is dear to my heart. Thank you got treating it so respectfully!
I’m not surprised you struggled with this Georgia. When you said Lemmy turned on the sander and a spark formed , I went cold. What a good job you did telling this story x Thankyou x
Thank you for covering this. I’ve grown up knowing about this because my grandmother grew up in New London and her elder siblings attended school there. There is a museum and a memorial that you can visit to this day and I always found it fascinating that this is the reason they started scenting natural gas.
You should do a video on the Galveston Hurricane. It’s soo old and lost in history but it’s soo important to history and meteorology.
I would like to see that as well. I grew up close to Galveston, and I remember having nightmares as kid after hearing about it. It made me take hurricane evacuation more serious though.
My dad showed me that. And deer gods…
Learn something new every day. I know the distinctive smell of natural gas leak is from additive. But not the history behind safety measure. Tragic. Yet, I can only think of exponential lives saved as safety measures resulting from tragic loss.
6:40 Thanks to the YT channel "Fascinating Horror", I can now pinpoint exactly when the victim's fates were sealed. ☹It has taught me that cutting corners has literally caused 95% of all manmade disasters and still we refuse to stop doing such things!
Loopholes
Thank you for covering this story. It breaks my heart to imagine all these parents digging through the rubble hoping their child wasn't among the deceased. As a Texan I can't believe I've never even heard of this story
Holy crap Walter Cronkite goes that far back!
This is only about 30 miles from where I grew up, live and my families live. I have taken my kids to the museum. My dad told us about it. It was very sad for sure. Some older people wouldn't talk about it.
Thank You Georgia I learned something new today! 👍🏾
Please do a video covering the Great Depression. It affected the futures of millions of people. Many went from riches to rags literally.
I am 35 and History has always been my favorite!! Most likely bc it was my dad's favorite he was always taking me to museums and historical sites.....
So I really appreciate you covering these type of case's
I listen to your videos every day basically, I love you Georgia!
From the little glimpses we’re getting of your home… it looks lovely!!
Wow, this actually isn’t but a few hours from me.
P.s much love from North East Texas 😊 I absolutely love your content.
I LOVE your historical videos!
Excellent presentation. Thank you!
I live in Texas and never heard of this case. So sad so many children lost their lives for a bit of change to come
I really appreciate all the work you put into those videos. Thank you so much
Could you do the Wilhelm Gustloff the worse maritime disaster that killed 9,400 Germans men women and children?
All laws and rules of safety are written in blood.
I would love to see a video on the Great Depression
Great job on this video. It was very well put together.
Georgia you are so kind you look so sad i am so happy you brought this up i never head about this thank you
I would love a Great Depression and/or the Oil Boom in Texas videos.
Well done as usual!❤ Im not complaining, but are the history videos staying on this channel or going to the other?
Sound is incredible
What a sad tragedy. Can you please talk about the Halifax explosion that happened in 1917. Over 1700 people passed away in a single day.
Another fine example of the skilled public policy of middle America, farsighted and thoughtful. 😭😱😠
You should cover the Halifax Explosion in Nova Scotia Canada
I love your history series Georgia 💗
Great video as always! You should consider looking at the case of Kyron Horman! It's a very well known missing persons case where I'm from and I think it would be interesting to hear your perspective on it! Again, great video!
She's already covered Kyron Horman ❤️
@@genevievebertagnolli1615 I did not know that! I'll have to watch it, thanks a bunch!!!
This was new to me so thank you for your video
I'm 64 and my grandparents were born around 1900. I'm from the Northeast, but I understand the time in which this happened---the difference in people's ways and beliefs.
People of the 1930s had very little vocabulary for discussing trauma or loss. If there was a death, and you held a funeral, that was the only real time to recognize a tragic event. After that, you were expected to just get on with your life.
Miscarriages and children lost in infancy were not discussed publicly. Women never mentioned their periods and many girls didn't know such things existed until they got theirs---at which time they often thought they were dying, that they had cancer. If lucky, they sought out a school nurse about it, who explained. Girls' mothers often refused to discuss any of it, other than to say "here's some old bedsheets I tore up. These are yours now. You'll have to boil them clean each month and re-use them from now on. Because now you're a woman. Don't tell your father. And stay away from those big boys at school," and that was that: New normal, no way to talk about it. The rigors of childbirth were never publicly discussed either, except very briefly: my tiny grandmother told my equally tiny mother that giving birth was like dying. No further elaboration.
Yeah, it was a different, pull-up-your-socks and get-on-with-it time. All the pain of life existed, but people just shoved it away and tried not to dwell.
It was what was universally expected. Very primitive.
You should do Mt Saint Helen
A similarly astounding and terrible story is the St. Francis Dam disaster from Southern California in 1928.
i have never heard of this before this video! so heartbreaking :( i guess at least something good came out of it, but still... at what cost
Wow! That was brutal!
Can you please look into the Glen Cinema disaster in paisley, Scotland on the
31 December 1929
You should do the one in bath school distator
My sensitive nose is why I can catch smells before others I'll never forget when the smell of low oil smelled literally like burning rubber and it was because it was low and the car was having troubles using what was left mom was eventually the one to figure out might be something low in the car as it only smelled when the car started so she started with the water nothing then she went to the oil and found the problem and yes it was that cause I didn't smell it again I know what burning rubber smells like cause our brakes going up the mountain one time smelled like that both me and my sister were green somehow my aunt who was riding with us wasn't affected parents understandable as they were at the front and brakes at the back she knew something was wrong cause her exact words were I never seen somebody so green when she looked at me dad had to pull over which was dangerous in those curves to investigate the cause and then figured it out and told us just to hold on a little longer till we got to the top of the mountain it has a stop area that you can see all the other mountains and was a safer stop we ended up having to stay about an hour on that top for the brakes to cool and for my sister and I to recover how green was I? Well I don't even remember enjoying the sight I always love enjoying the other mountains until the last 5 minutes
I live 40 mins from New London and tend to pass thru when I go see my fiances older sister in longview. I never thought it was a big place since I road around the outskirts and never thought it had big history.
Other places in East tx you should learn and make videos about are rusk(there was a accidental kill from my geometry teacher there her younger sister died from the train that use to run thru their town) , longview, Henderson, and jacksonville (there tend to be alot of deaths and murders in these areas due to drug addicts and abusive parents and repetitive cycles.)
New London is still small. I live there and our population has been stagnant since 1937.
I probably missed it, but did any of the teachers (besides the one who probably caused the exposion) get affected as well or were they all with the parents?
Over 300 students and teachers died. There were both teacher and student survivors. My grandfather is Bill Thompson and he survived. He lived his whole life in a small house right across the street from the school.
why couldn’t they just be cheap for literally any other part of the building. why would they choose such a volatile option for a school- “let’s make this a death trap and hope the inevitable never happens! money money money!”
The boy in the box has been identified!!!
Just commenting for the algorithm 💜💙
Not related to the video, but they just reunited Melissa Highsmith with her family 51 years after her kidnapping! 😱
I was so happy to hear Melissa was able to be reunited with loved ones after all this time.
Have you ever heard of The Bhopal Gas Tragedy ?
👍👍👍
can you please cover the Hiroshima bombing(s)?
All those children gone or injured. Imagine sending your kids off to school only for them to never come home.
why do people with English accents have to do these videos ,with nothing but the narrators face showing ,,what is the video about ,,how pretty she is or how devastating the disaster was ,,oh well ,,there are better videos ,,