Note: This is a post I wrote in 2006 for the 1947Project.
January 4, 1947: Suppose, for a moment, that you are a 19-year-old mess cook second class stationed in San Pedro. Suppose further that while you are on leave in Los Angeles you get drunk, check into a cheap skid row hotel and someone rolls you for $30 ($283.93 USD 2005).
The location: 659 Maple Ave. via Google Street View.
What do you do? If you are Edward A. Pavlischak of Homestead, Pa., you get a can of gasoline from the nearest service station. Pavlischak used so much gas in setting fire to the hotel at 659 Maple St. that the explosion blew him backward into the street and singed off his eyebrows.
By the time four fire companies arrived, trapped hotel residents were hanging at the windows, about to jump to the street. Fire officials say 25 people were rescued with ladders. The fire killed Woodrow J. Tinsley, 28, of Bakersfield and injured five other people…