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'People Lived On': Overton library hosts event for 85th anniversary of New London school explosion

More than 290 people lost their lives when a natural gas explosion destroyed the New London school on March 18, 1937.

OVERTON, Texas — “This explosion didn’t kill the spirit. People lived on. People raised families and had grandkids and great-grandkids.”

Jimmie Piercy, president of the London Museum, described the long-lasting legacy of the tragic 1937 East Texas school explosion to an audience at McMillan Memorial Library in Overton on Tuesday.

The library hosted a special “Book Talk” event for a screening of a news documentary about the tragedy from its 50th anniversary in 1987, as well as comments from Piercy. More than 290 people lost their lives when a natural gas explosion destroyed the New London school on March 18, 1937. The 85th anniversary of the explosion is March 18.

Read more from our news partners, the Kilgore News-Herald

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