Anyone remember the bizarre spectacle of a river on fire?
I remember it – big story at the time. My wife (Cleveland born and bred) was in grad school and she took quite a ribbing.
Of course the Cuyahoga is much prettier and less flammable these days.
Ah, the Mistake by the Lake. I used to get ribbed so much about being from Cleveland when I first entered the military. AS soon as people found out I was from Cleveland everyone and their mother always asked me, “Didn’t the river catch on fire up there?”
Me? I wasn’t even born when it happened but it must have been some spectacle.
Actually, it burned multiple times. From Wiki:
Drat! I was hoping the Wikipedia article had pictures of the fire. Nope. So I Googled, and here’s some of what I found:
From the 1952 fire: according to this source, “No press photo exists of the 1969 fire - news agencies used photos from the 1952 blaze.” More from that site:
A tug fights a river fire – while the accompanying text discusses the 1969 fire, there’s no direct attribution of the photo to that one, and a very similar (if not the same) photo at another site is described as of the 1952 fire.
Googling for images produced only those two pictures, both of the 1952 fire.
We had something similar several years ago. Following some bad weather, I called my friend to see how she was faring. She said “Well, my town is flooded and my river is on fire, but other than that we are O.K.”
Off topic- another time she told me “Man, I got pulled over for drunk driving.” I asked “Did you go to jail?” “No” she said. “They took me to the Hilton. Funny thing was, the paint was peeling off the walls and the whole place smelled like urine.”
The river is reported to be much less colorful these days:
“Today, the Cuyahoga is home to more than 60 species of fish, said Jim White, executive director of the Cuyahoga River Community Planning Organization, a nonprofit group that coordinates cleanup efforts. Beavers, blue herons and bald eagles nest along the river’s banks. Long sections of the Cuyahoga are clean enough that they no longer require aggressive monitoring, regulators said.”
I’m amazed at how people still associate this with Cleveland. If I tell people I’m going to Cleveland, they’ll say 'Heh-heh, hope the river doesn’t catch on fire." Even people who are way too young to remember any of the fires say stuff like that. I guess it’s like Chicago and Al Capone.
Burn On, Randy Newman
According to the NPR story that aired yesterday, it wasn’t that uncommon for rivers to catch fire in industrial areas in the first half of the 20th century. I’m not sure what “non uncommon” translates to in actual numbers, but it’s probably somewhat unfair that Cleveland is the city most associated with burning rivers.
That’s true. Cleveland just had the misfortune of the most recent fire occurring in 1969, at a time of burgeoning environmental consciousness, when it was the perfect symbol of rust belt pollution run amok.
River On Fire, Adam Again
Seeing as how I turn 40 myself in just a few short weeks, I’m going to say, no, I don’t remember, because that was before I was born! (I was born on the same day as Neil Armstrong’s alleged moon walk. 
)
But I tell that story a lot, living in the Deep South, where nobody here seems to have ever heard of the event. Hilarity ensues every time.
All that said, I’m delighted and very proud of the city of Cleveland for the cleanup and major 180º they’ve done with the Flats area and downtown in general. It’s a really fun downtown to visit now!
many rivers and streams in western pa would catch fire. before gasoline was used it was dumped into the nearest body of water as waste from producing kerosene. pa has some of the earliest oil wells.
For what it’s worth, the Associated Press has the second photo in its archives with the caption:
With the confusion, if I use the photo, I think I’ll just write the caption as “one of many fires on the Cuyahoga River.”
Cuyahoga, REM
Actually this looks like someone trying to put out a fire on the tug. The tug seems to have smoke coming from it and the water is clearly being sprayed from the bridge, not the tug.
Never heard that song before, but it’s obvious Michael Stipe didn’t do any research before recording that song - at least, he sure doesn’t know how to pronounce Cuyahoga!
(FTR, it’s pronounced kye-uh-HOE-guh, not “coy-”)
It’s Cincinnati Bengals fans like me just trying to do our part to keep the good memories alive…
And, from my time living in Cleveland, the pronunciation if different depending on which side of the river you live on.
East: generally “kuy-uh-HOE-guh”
West: generally “kuy-uh-HAWG-uh” or “kuy-uh-HAW-guh”
One would think there would be more photos of the river catching fire than just those two tugboat photos; at least something from 1969 in color.