Fire drills were always fun when I was in school. It got us outside for a while, and away from the drudgery of "learning." We didn't realize it at the time, but those protocols became well ingrained in every student and teacher, until we couldn't imagine doing it any other way. We also had nuclear attack drills occasionally, but no one took those seriously because we couldn't imagine actually surviving one.
It's sad that most safety innovations come after a tragedy, because no one ever visualized what could possibly go wrong until it's too late. American schools grew bigger and bigger over time, and still became crowded during the Baby Boom. In December of 1958, a fire broke out at a parochial school in Chicago. Before it was over, 92 students and three nuns were dead. Immediately, school authorities nationwide rethought building standards and safety protocols for schools. The tragedy was that many of these fire codes were already in place in Chicago, but older buildings were exempt. The new idea of fire drills was found to be very useful in only a short time. Stewart Hicks explains how those came about. The video is not as long as it looks, as the last minute and a half are promotional.
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Ours were a bit more than occasional. I didn't like them - had to go into the basement and sit cross-legged facing a wall, bent over with your head down and hands clasped over your head for what seemed like forever. It was not comfortable and you got yelled at if you moved out of that position. Surviving was not on anyone's mind; we were too young to know any better. Imagine the teachers though differently but that was not something we were aware of.
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