_Percentage _Percentage
_Total Fires due to due to
_City or State_ accounted for_ tobacco_ matches_ _Total_
New York City 10,330 12.3 15.7 28
New York State
(Outside of Greater
New York) 5,599 5.2 8.8 14.0
Philadelphia 2,784 5.0 25.5 30.5
Boston 3,443 15.6[9]
Newark 1,108 9.8 20.8 30.6
New Haven 681 7.9 5.6 13.5
[Footnote 9: Includes careless use of matches and pipe, cigar,
cigarette. In addition the report enumerates 5% as caused by
matches, careless use of, and set by rats.]
It would be futile with our present knowledge to try to construct any
general average showing what percentage of fires in the country at
large can fairly be charged to smokers. In some of the western states
and cities in particular, the records are obviously incomplete as in
the report of the state fire marshal of Illinois, which gives less
than half as many fires for the city of Chicago during the year 1912
as were reported by the city fire marshal for the same period. And it
is only fair to say that in some of these western sections of the
country the percentage is much smaller than in the cities given above.
One fact is, however, incontestable, and that is that smokers are
recognized in all of the reports received as at least one of the
important causes of fires and are sometimes, as in New York City, the
most important single cause. This is clearly shown in the following
extract from the report of the fire department for the year 1912: