It was a 100-year-old "building built to burn," according to Fire Engineering. Combustible building materials and open corridors, stairwells, and vertical shafts coupled with a lack of sprinklers and alarms led to a holocaust that killed 74. After the fire, Illinois governor Adlai Stevenson ordered a report to identify and fix fire hazards in all the hospitals in the state. Hospitals across the United States followed suit.