More Than 100 Spectators All Unconscious of Horror Beside Them Sit in Canonsburg Playhouse Following Story Told By the Photographic Film - Do Not Hear Fatal Cry of "Fire."

Canonsburg, Aug 27 - Over 100 persons sat in the auditorium of the Morgan theater last night, serenely watching the remainder of a long film of motion pictures as it flickered on the screen while a score and a half human beings were being trampled, smothered and ground to a horrible death in the entrance of the playhouse just below. Totally unconscious of the tragedy which was being enacted in the very building, almost within sight, a portion of the big audience in the front of the house, thinking perhaps the hurried exit had been but a momentary bit of excitement, stayed until the picture had been concluded.

It had been nothing but a flash, a single scream of "Fire," brief stampede in the back of the big hall, and then the film was continued. Quieted by shouts of assurance from Manager Ferguson, and his assistants, and while the piano kept drumming out a tuneful fragment of melody, these unwitting spectators saw but the little drama that was being thrown from the picture machine.

The picture, in its plot and setting, was simple. But it had an appeal. It told of the rustic housewife, attached by the ties of her religion to the little country congregation. The Ladies Aide society had planned to give a "social" to secure funds to purchase a new carpet. The little housewife, despite the protestations of a miserly husband, had baked a monster cake, brave in its garnishing of chocolate icing. She was exhibiting the toothsome handiwork of her culinary art when the death followed flash flickered across the canvas.

There was a slight pause. Then the picture proceeded. The housewife took her cake to the fair, it was sold, and she was given the proceeds of the affair as treasurer of the ladies' guild. The rest of the picture was simple. It was the struggle of a wayward daughter in a faroff city, lying sick and at the point of death.

The mother was sent for; the father unrelenting, refused to provide the mother for the journey to see the daughter, she pilfered the fat, cracked teapot where the carpet money was reposing for safe keeping. She went, the daughter died, and she returned with the little granddaughter.

The old grandfather, overcome by the timid generosity of the golden-haired mite, was besieged by remorse. He was induced to make good is wife's embezzlement. It all ended happily, and when the film was ended, there was many a sigh of satisfaction from the audience. Below were being carried away bodies. Another life film had been reeled to its end, a horrible climax.

In the audience, and among those who stayed to see the finish of the picture and unmindful of the catastrophe below, were W. L. Alban of 139 North Central avenue, and G. D. Morrison of 305 Greenside avenue.

"We were entirely ignorant of the fact that anything was wrong," said Alban, "until we had seen the end of the picture and had started to go out. Just then the firemen and policemen were beginning to crowd through the exit doors, and we heard the shouts of the rescuers and the groans from the injured down below. Then we knew that something horrible had been happening while we were sitting there enjoying the picture."

"I did not even hear the cry of fire," continued Alban. "We were interested in the picture. We saw the flash, saw people leaving in the rear of the theatre, and then after several persons shouted from the stage that nothing was wrong we quieted ourselves with the reassurance that it was only a momentary scare. The house was packed. There must have been 700 "2 800 people in the house at the time, and the Saturday night house packed the theatre. There were over 100 when the picture was finished, who did not seem to even realize that there was anything the matter.

"I had my wife with me to see the show. We were compelled to go down a fire escape. The stairway was an awful jam of people and we didn't know how many of them were dead when we got to the street."