September 18, 2023: AmericanStudying the Panic of 1873: Two Fires

[On September20th, 1873, the New York Stock Exchange closed for tendays, a key moment in the developing economic crisis that came to be known as the Panicof 1873. So for the 150th anniversary of that moment this weekI’ll AmericanStudy a handful of Panic contexts, leading up to a weekend post on2023 echoes of those histories!]

On how twodisasters helped set the stage for the Panic, and why they’re even moresignificant than that.

I wrote atlength about the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 for my SaturdayEvening Post Considering History columna few years back, so in lieu of a first paragraph here, I’d ask you to checkout that column and then come on back here. Thanks!

Welcomeback! For whatever reason (maybe it’s that damned cow), the Chicago Fire is farbetter remembered than the following year’s GreatBoston Fire of 1872, but that latter one seems to have been just about asdestructive, meaning that one of America’s oldest cities and one of its newestones both experienced parallel, equally terrible tragedies in the early 1870s. Whilethere are lots of contributing causesof the Panic of 1873 (including the most proximate one, a Congressional lawI’ll discuss in tomorrow’s post), these two fires are definitely high on thelist, as the stunning level ofproperty damage they produced led to significant bank and financialshortages as the communities sought to respond and rebuild. Much like the GreatDepression, this Panic and the subsequent depression (on which more inWednesday’s post) really began with runs onthe banks, and it’s fair to say that those runs were due both to actual financialshortages and to the widespread uncertainty and fear that can follow thesekinds of disasters.

So theChicago and Boston fires were important factors in the lead-up to the Panic of1873, and well worth more of a place in our collective memories as a result(Boston at all, and Chicago more accurately, as I discussed in that column). ButI would argue that these two fires also reflect and exemplify something elseabout America in the early 1870s, a related but more overarching point: itshugely rapid (and only increasing) urbanization. Obviouslyfires can and do occur in any community, and are hugely destructive and tragicwherever and whenever they happen. But there’s a certain kind of fire thatconsumes a developing urban center, as embodied most famously perhaps by the 1666Great Fire of London and as would define another rapidlydeveloping American city a few decades after Chicago and Boston. I’m notnecessarily suggesting that fires are a given in those settings and periods—butit does seem a common (if still tragic) part of the urbanization process, areflection perhaps of growth that outpaces infrastructure. That’s a big part ofwhere America was in the early 1870s, a moment ripe for fires and, it seems,Panics as well.

Next 1873contexts tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think?