The fire began in the basement, in what was called the Melody Lounge. According to accounts, a busboy was trying to tighten a light bulb that had apparently been loosened by a soldier looking for some privacy with his girlfriend. While trying to re-screw it, the bulb popped out, and trying to get a better view of the socket, the busboy struck a match that caught some of the extremely flammable tropical decorations on fire.
Compounding the tragedy, the club didn’t have any safety precautions set up. The main entrance was a single revolving door, windows were boarded up and other entrances were bolted shut for various reasons that dated back to the time when the club was a speakeasy. The club's owner was eventually found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to 12 to 15 years, of which he only served four of before dying of cancer a few weeks after his early release.
To memorialize the tragedy, a small bronze plaque is set into the red brick of a sidewalk outside of a parking lot near where the club once stood. It was created by Anthony P. Marra, the youngest survivor of the tragic inferno. The plaque bears a schematic of the club layout with seven palm trees, an explanation of the fire, and the phrase, “Phoenix out of the Ashes,” a reference to the changes in fire codes and advances in burn treatments that occurred as a result of the tragedy.
