New London School Explosion - Aftermath

Aftermath

A new school was completed in 1939 on the property, directly behind the location of the destroyed building. The school remained known as the London School until 1965 when London ISD consolidated with Gaston ISD, the name was changed to West Rusk High School, and the mascot was changed to the Raiders. A large granite cenotaph on the median of Texas State Highway 42 across from the new school commemorates the 1937 disaster. The London Museum and Tea House is across the highway, and its curator Mollie Ward is an explosion survivor.

The majority of the victims of the explosion are buried at Pleasant Hill Cemetery, near New London.

Experts from the United States Bureau of Mines concluded that the connection to the residue gas line was faulty. The connection had allowed gas to leak into the school, and since natural gas is invisible and is odorless, the leak was unnoticed. To reduce the damage of future leaks, the Texas Legislature began mandating within weeks of the explosion that thiols (mercaptans) be added to natural gas. The strong odor of many thiols makes leaks quickly detectable. The practice quickly spread worldwide.

Shortly after the disaster, the Texas Legislature met in emergency session and enacted the Engineering Registration Act (now rewritten as the Texas Engineering Practice Act). Public pressure was on the government to regulate the practice of engineering due to the faulty installation of the natural gas connection; Carolyn Jones, a nine year old survivor, spoke to the Texas Legislature about the importance of safety in schools. The use of the title "engineer" in Texas remains legally restricted to those who have been professionally certified by the state to practice engineering.

A lawsuit was brought against the school district and the Parade Gasoline Company, but the court ruled that neither could be held responsible. Superintendent W.C. Shaw was forced to resign amid talk of a lynching. Shaw lost a son in the explosion.

Over the years, the New London School explosion received relatively little attention given the magnitude of the event. Explanations for this are speculative, but most center around residents' unwillingness to discuss the tragedy. L.V. Barber said of his father Lonnie, "I can remember newspaper people coming around every now and then, asking him questions about that day, but he never had much to say." Nevertheless, in recent years, as the disaster has gained historical perspective, it has been increasingly treated by researchers and journalists.

For example, the 50th anniversary of the event was commemorated in part by the release of a documentary, "The Day A Generation Died," written, produced, and directed by Jerry Gumbert.

The tragic events have been recalled through a play written by Dr. Bobby H. Johnson, a journalist and Professor Emeritus of History at Stephen F. Austin State University, Nacogdoches, Texas. Called A Texas Tragedy, the work has been performed as a one act play by students at Huntington High School in Huntington, Texas and in other regional venues.

In 2000, the New York publishing house Alfred A. Knopf signed the journalist Sara Mosle to write the definitive, non-fiction, historical account of the tragedy. Sara Mosle, a native of Texas and previously an editor and writer at The New York Times Book Review, a staff writer at The New Yorker and a frequent contributor to Slate.com, has often written about Texas subjects, public schools and education, and the inner lives of children. The book, which is based on more than 100 interviews with people directly connected to the explosion and extensive archival research, is forthcoming from Knopf. It describes the years leading up to the tragedy, including the discovery of the East Texas oil field (where Sara Mosle's grandfather worked on the rigs and her mother grew up), reporters such as Walter Cronkite and the Dallas journalist and editor Felix McKnight (whom Sara Mosle interviewed before both men died), and the years after the explosion, when survivors slowly came to terms with the tragedy.

In 2008, some of the last living survivors of the explosion shared their personal stories of their experience with documentary filmmaker and East Texas native, Kristin Beauchamp. The feature length documentary, titled "When Even Angels Wept," was released in 2009 and was a first-hand account of the disaster. It is told almost exclusively by survivors and eye witnesses. They share what they experienced on the afternoon leading up to the blast to what it was like to spend days searching East Texas towns, hospitals and morgues for missing loved ones.

As of 2009, the New London School Explosion stands as the deadliest school disaster in American history and the third deadliest disaster in the history of Texas, after the Galveston Hurricane of 1900, and the 1947 Texas City Disaster.

In March 2012, survivors and others gathered together at the town's rebuilt school in remembrance of the 75th anniversary of the disaster.