时间:2018-12-19 作者:英语课 分类:2007年NPR美国国家公共电台


英语课

A quick-thinking stranger helped Maureen Krekian escape one of the worst fire disasters in U.S. history.


Time now for StoryCoprs, a project that's traveling the country recording 1 your stories. On this summer day in 1944, a circus in Hartford, Connecticut went up in flames. Nearly 9000 people had crowded under the big top that day. Shortly after the show began, the tent caught fire. It had been waterproofed 2 with a mixture of gasoline and wax, causing the big top to be completely consumed in less than 10 minutes. That fire claimed 167 lives, over 1/3 of them children. And became one of the nation's deadliest ever. Maureen Krekian was at the circus that day.

Hartford this afternoon suffered one of the greatest catastrophes 3 in its history, and during a matinee performance of Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey circus, the big tent suddenly burst into flame and burned to the ground.

It was 1944 July the 6th, a very hot day. I was 11 years old. I was supposed to go to the circus with the lady next door and her daughter. I went and knocked on the door and they weren't there. They had already left without me. Now I had never been to the circus before, and there was no way that I was going to go home and tell my grandmother that I was alone. That would never have been permitted. So, I just ran up to street, and went to the circus by myself.

The Flying Wallendas, the world famous aerial act were performing on their trapezes when the fire broke.

I remember somebody yelling and seeing a big ball of fire near the top of the tent. And this ball of fire just got bigger and bigger and bigger.

An eyewitness 4 told us that it appeared almost like spontaneous combustion 5, so quickly was the big tent of a mass of flame.

By that time, everybody was panicking. The exit was blocked with the cages that the animals were brought in and out with. And there was a man taking kids and flinging them up and over that cage to get them out. I was sitting up probably halfway 6 upon the bleachers. And jumped down, you jumped down and it was all straw underneath 7. And there was a young man, a kid, he had a pocketknife. And he slit 8 the tent, took my arm and pulled me out. And then I turned around and grabbed a kid, it was a little girl, and pulled her out.

The bleachers were burned to a crease 9, 60 bodies were removed from that spot alone.

My uncle was out in the backyard of our home. We lived on the same street as where the circus was held. And he was sawing wood, and he saw the reflection of the fire in his saw. He went running around, trying to find me. And of course he couldn't get anywhere near it by that time.

Parents and relatives were standing 10 about not knowing what had become of their families.

I came running out from the circus tent, all the way home. I can still see my uncle. He was so mad. You know ,how you'd get when you have a child. And you think they are lost, then you wanna kill them and kiss them at the same time.

The spot where the tent'd been was a giant mess of walls and wires.

The circus never came back to Hartford until the 70s. And then they never came back in a tent again. But I've never had a desire to go.

What if that boy heard this interview? What would you like to say to him?

Oh, I'd throw my arms around him and thank him, I wouldn't be 74 years old today. I'd be long gone.

It's a tragedy Hartford will never forget and everyone in Hartford hopes it will never be repeated.

Maureen Krekian remembering the Hartford circus fire of 1944 with her daughters Lynn and Joanne. The newscast you heard was from WTIC Radio in Hartford. This interview will be archived with all StoryCorps interviews at the Library of Congress. Subscribe 11 to the StoryCorps podcast at npr.org.



1 recording
n.录音,记录
  • How long will the recording of the song take?录下这首歌得花多少时间?
  • I want to play you a recording of the rehearsal.我想给你放一下彩排的录像。
2 waterproofed
v.使防水,使不透水( waterproof的过去式和过去分词 )
  • Waterproofed 100% leather upper, with a light, durable polyurethane molded sole. 有一亮,持久聚氨基甲酸乙酯的使能防水100%皮革鞋帮塑造脚底。 来自互联网
  • The outer covering of the egg is waterproofed to prevent the embryo from drying out. 鸡蛋的外壳是不透水的,防止胚胎失水。 来自互联网
3 catastrophes
n.灾祸( catastrophe的名词复数 );灾难;不幸事件;困难
  • Two of history's worst natural catastrophes occurred in 1970. 1970年发生了历史上最严重两次自然灾害。 来自辞典例句
  • The Swiss deposits contain evidence of such catastrophes. 瑞士的遗址里还有这种灾难的证据。 来自辞典例句
4 eyewitness
n.目击者,见证人
  • The police questioned several eyewitness to the murder.警察询问了谋杀案的几位目击者。
  • He was the only eyewitness of the robbery.他是那起抢劫案的唯一目击者。
5 combustion
n.燃烧;氧化;骚动
  • We might be tempted to think of combustion.我们也许会联想到氧化。
  • The smoke formed by their combustion is negligible.由它燃烧所生成的烟是可忽略的。
6 halfway
adj.中途的,不彻底的,部分的;adv.半路地,在中途,在半途
  • We had got only halfway when it began to get dark.走到半路,天就黑了。
  • In study the worst danger is give up halfway.在学习上,最忌讳的是有始无终。
7 underneath
adj.在...下面,在...底下;adv.在下面
  • Working underneath the car is always a messy job.在汽车底下工作是件脏活。
  • She wore a coat with a dress underneath.她穿着一件大衣,里面套着一条连衣裙。
8 slit
n.狭长的切口;裂缝;vt.切开,撕裂
  • The coat has been slit in two places.这件外衣有两处裂开了。
  • He began to slit open each envelope.他开始裁开每个信封。
9 crease
n.折缝,褶痕,皱褶;v.(使)起皱
  • Does artificial silk crease more easily than natural silk?人造丝比天然丝更易起皱吗?
  • Please don't crease the blouse when you pack it.包装时请不要将衬衫弄皱了。
10 standing
n.持续,地位;adj.永久的,不动的,直立的,不流动的
  • After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
  • They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。
11 subscribe
vi.(to)订阅,订购;同意;vt.捐助,赞助
  • I heartily subscribe to that sentiment.我十分赞同那个观点。
  • The magazine is trying to get more readers to subscribe.该杂志正大力发展新订户。
学英语单词
abscessed teeth
adamellite
administer relief
almas
aul wan
barytons
Batu Pulai, Sungai
be skilled at
beef tongues
borefest
cancer pathophysiology
carotid arch
catch a disease
centrifugal pendulum
civitated
country of residence
cromoglycate
decision support system - DSS
dial - up access
down price
ekalead
electronic pick up
emoia atrocostata
epithallus
fairy circles
feel your way
ferroelectric non-volatile memory
final working drawings
firedamp migration
go on errands
gurdfish
hemicontinuous operator
herborises
honeycomb radiator
incidence point
indolent
internal cylindrical gauge
IPG
japann
judicial separation
jump out of skin
Karkar I.
kissins
koat
la charite
Leontopolis
ligg. intercuneiformia plantaria
light repeater
linkage analysis
location variable type
longspur
magnetoresistances
marine electric power station
marine energy resource
marine refraction seismic survey
master scheduler
mercuric lactate
mercury ballast of gyrocompass
methylal resin
meyers
michelman
Molotor cocktail
monologists
multi-valued displacement
multistage scrubber
nit-pickers
Nocardia actinoides
nonfashion
nonintersecting lines
observance of good seamanship
orbifolding
ordered scattering
parental involvement
plancks
plite
pneutronic ammeter
polyether diols
purchase of goods
radial inlet
readily available
receiver operating characteristics curve
regentess
Retina Display
rinsed-out
Routh array table
Sambang
satellisation
saturn-day
sawhney
scrikes
seam-welding equipment
self compatible
semen diluter
semianaerobic condition
Sid Caesar
sphagna
subsurface burst
superhigh frequency
talk down to
tidly
unheal
xenocrystal