A fire broke out inside Philadelphia’s historic Wanamaker building Tuesday morning sending workers and shoppers out onto the street.
The blaze began shortly before 10 a.m. in the building across from City Hall at 13th and Market streets that now houses a Macy’s department store and offices.
The fire occurred in a ninth floor office and was under control a short while later, according to fire dispatchers.
There were no reports of injuries but with people out on the sidewalk and fire equipment on the scene, traffic around City Hall came to a halt for nearly an hour. By 10:45 a.m., traffic began moving again.
The Wanamaker Building is the 15-story former site of John Wanamaker's store that features a Grand Court, the Crystal Tea Room and an impressive pipe organ. The store was absorbed into a Hecht's than Macy's in the mid-1990s.
