On Sunday evening, April 14, 1913, a wall caved in at the historic Lindell House Hotel on Depot Street near the Knox College campus. Originally known as the American Hotel it was a stopover for Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas during their Galesburg visits, being situated next door to the original Burlington Railroad Depot. Miraculously no one was hurt; however, a nearby shoe shop was demolished and it caused great panic among its boarders. Most of the residents were foreigners employed at the Burlington Tie Plant.

The manager of the hotel/boarding house was Frank “Franz” Karun (often spelled Kurun or Korun), who barely escaped being trapped in the rubble. Karun, who was 39 years old, was from Austria/Slovenia and resided in the Lindell House with his wife and five children.

The fact that Frank Karun escaped injury during the building’s collapse likely confirmed that he was born under a lucky star. There was indeed a very peculiar circumstance in connection with building’s collapse. It was exactly one year earlier to the day and hour, April 14, 1912, that the famed Titanic hit an iceberg and eventually sank. The tragic accident was the worst peacetime maritime disaster in history, resulting in the death of 1,517 passengers.

The Titanic, which surpassed all rivals in luxury and opulence, began her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, bound for New York City on April 12, 1912. Among the passengers were Frank Karun, his 4-year-old daughter Manca and his wife’s brother-in-law. Karun was returning from his homeland after selling the family farm for $750, all of which was lost when the Titanic sank. The threesome boarded the ill-fated Titanic at Cherbourg as third class passengers. Karun related that he picked out the best boat so they could enjoy the trip back to America better.

It is probably becoming obvious that Frank Karun and his 4-year-old daughter, who were at the time Galesburg residents, were two of the only 706 who survived the sinking of the Titanic. In fact, Karun was among only a few males, as most survivors were women and small children.

Both the Galesburg Republican Register and the Galesburg Evening Mail published extensive descriptions of the father and daughters experiences in surviving the tragedy that contained many errors and conflicting details because of very difficult media communication problems during that time period.

Karun described in his broken English that he was asleep when the Titanic struck the iceberg. He was in the third class sleeping room at the rear of the boat with his daughter and brother-in-law John Markum. When they quickly dressed and got to the deck they could see the forward end of the boat was sinking. A lifeboat was lowered, perhaps the last one, and Karun’s daughter was lowered first. Karun was the last to be lowered by rope, which greatly surprised him since all the rest were women and children. There were 52 people on the rescue boat.

Karun related that they spent nearly five hours in the rescue boat in freezing temperatures. They were fortunate to be rescued and placed aboard the rescue ship Carpathia. Upon arrival of the rescue ship in New York, Karun and his daughter were taken to St. Vincent’s Hospital. They spent two and a half days in the hospital, eventually returning to Galesburg on a Burlington train at 10 p.m. April 22.

In 1914 the Karun family returned to Austria/Slovenia. Manca’s (the daughter who survived the Titanic tragedy with her father) four siblings returned to the United States and lived out their lives in America.

Frank “Franz” Karun died in Milje, Slovenia, on July 7, 1934.

Tom Wilson is a local historian. Write to him at mailto:wilsont29@comcast.netor at The Register-Mail, 140 S. Prairie St., Galesburg, IL 61401.