Doors at Iroquois Theater

So many Iroquois Theater stories involve doors that it seems useful to give them numbers that can be referenced less cumbersomely than with such mouthfuls as, "northwest fire escape exit on third floor."

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Green = opened easily
Purple = opened with difficulty
Red = locked or stuck –unopenable
Light blue = conflicting reports

Door No.	Guenzel No	Configuration	Condition
1a 1b	-	Wicket style 20' high door for scenery with inner standard size door opening inward	Opened Blocked by performers
2a 2b	d		Opened Opened
3a 3b	d		Stuck - never opened
4a 4b	d		Opened Opened
5a 5b	-		Opened Opened
6a 6b 6c	c		Locked Locked Locked
7a 7b 7c	c		Locked Opened Opened
8a 8b 8c	c		Locked Locked Locked
9	-		Locked
10a 10b 10c	b		Locked Locked Opened
13a 13b 13c	b		Locked Opened Opened
16a 16b 16c	b		Locked Locked Opened
19a 19b	a		Locked Locked
21a 21b	a		Opened Opened
23a 23b	a		Opened Opened
25a 25b	a		Opened Opened
27a 27b	a		Locked Locked

Front entrance doors

Front entrance doors at Iroquois Theater

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Green = opened easily
Purple = opened with difficulty
Red = locked or stuck –unopenable
Light blue = conflicting reports

Door No.	Guenzel No	Configuration	Condition
28a 28b	g		Opened Opened
29a 29b	m		Opened Opened
30a 30b	m		Stuck - never opened
31a 31b	m		Maybe stuck, maybe opened*
32a 32b 32c	f		Locked Locked
33a 33b 33c 33d	e		Partly opened
34	-		Locked

* Guenzel reported the door never opened but at least one person testified having escaped from the exit easily.

FIRE ESCAPE DOORS

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Fire escape door drops caused falls

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Green = opened easily
Purple = opened with difficulty
Red = locked or stuck –unopenable
Light blue = conflicting reports

Door No.	Guenzel No	Configuration	Condition
35a 35b	n		Opened Opened
36a 36b	n		Opened Opened
37a 37b	n		Opened Opened
38a 38b 38c	i		Locked Locked
39a 39b 39c	h		Partly opened broke off hinges
40	k		Locked
41	-		Locked

UTILITY STAIRWELL DOOR

Three men tried valiantly to open this second floor door in the utility stairwell to save the Strong family and a couple dozen others. If the fireball had been delayed five minutes, all the people in the stairwell might have been saved.

AUDITORIUM DOORS

Auditorium doors at Iroquois Theater did NOT open inward

You will find many sources stating that the doors at the Iroquois Theater opened inwards and it is not accurate, as evidenced by photos and Louis Guenzel's report. Fire escape doors employed the bascule latch that few knew how to open, and other doors required loosening pins to open all the wings, but they opened outward. I owe this understanding to Chicago Death Trap author, Nat Brandt, who pointed it out in a talk you can watch on cspan.

A few tips to make it easier to parse out door-related material you find in period newspaper accounts of the Iroquois disaster.

Of the thirty-odd doors at the Iroquois Theater, thirteen doorways led out of the structure. References to them was imprecise at best. So inexact was some reported testimony that I cannot imagine how jurors at the coroner's inquest or grand jury inquiry were able to decipher it accurately, even given their two walk-throughs. Newspapers reported only fragments, of course. Had full transcripts survived to study, presumably many ambiguities would be eliminated. Am thinking not all, though. Chicago reporters able to take notes during proceedings, sometimes became confused. I'd love to know what if any visual aids would have been used in the courtroom had the case ever come to trial. Without enlarged posters of floor plans and establishing a labeling system for doors, serious miscommunication would have been inevitable. Just checked and found a few newspaper references to attorneys presenting photographs and charts at trial but not enough to suggest it was commonplace.
The number of references to a doorway was in inverse proportion to the deadliness of the doorway. Eyewitness accounts referencing the three doorways in the lobby (nos. 10-16), at which two were locked but no one died, far outnumbered accounts referencing the other ten doorways that were death portals for all but a handful of the six hundred fatalities. The disproportionate coverage of lobby doors is simple: a majority of those who passed through the lobby exits lived to talk about it.
Another doorway that received disproportionate news coverage was the door at the bottom of the utility stairwell (door no. 40). Fewer than 5% of the fatalities took place in that stairwell but almost every newspaper in the country included several paragraphs about it, many failing to identify it as a narrow stairwell never intended for use by theater goers and none putting it together with the operator of the lamp that started the fire. Other than that the sole survivor, James Strong, seemed to grant interviews freely, I'm not sure what about the bare bones of the story so caught editorial attention.