Recently in accidents Category

A recent post concerned harness racing at the York Fair way back in 1867, over 150 years ago. A reader commented that he remembered non-harness horse races at the fair when he was a boy, with jockeys without helmets.

Click here for post on 1867 races. Click here for 1929 York Fair races. Click here for current York Fair harness racing.

He didn't say when that was, but booklets and clippings in the York Fair file at the York County Heritage Trust Library/Archives indicate that racing with jockeys was also a long tradition, alongside the harness racing. At one time or another automobiles, motorcycles and bicycles were also raced at the fair.

You know how when it is really windy we sometimes exaggerate and say we were almost blown over. According to the York Dispatch of April 26, 1928, Rev. Dr. Milton K. Foster didn't have to exaggerate:

Every since humans discovered fire, we have been relying on it for cooking our food, keeping us warm, and lighting our way.

We also know the destruction and tragedy accidental fires can cause. Three items, datelined Hanover, from the April 25, 1908 York Gazette illustrate why fire needs to be treated with respect.

A previous post noted that a native Yorker, Richard M. Watt, was an expert witness in court concerning why the "unsinkable" Titanic sank. Click here to read that post.

No one was more surprised that April day than the vice-president of the White Star Line, Philip A. S. Franklin, whose parents were both natives of York.

York County, Pennsylvania people were having bell trouble, according to the November 20, 1877 issue of the York Gazette. Dillsburg's St. Paul's Lutheran Church had a cracked bell, and Mary Mayer of York broke her arm trying to ring a door bell.

Richard M. Watt, second from left, and the U.S.S. Maine

This week's Sunday News carried a story about a new book titled What Really Sank the Titanic. The authors came to a different conclusion that that offered by Rear Admiral Richard M. Watt, expert witness and York native, who testified in the 1915 White Star Line liability trial.

Watt, former Chief Constructor in the U.S. Navy faulted the owners, the White Star Line, for not allowing the builders to install longitudinal bulkheads and water-tight doors on the Titanic.

In a previous post I pointed out that traffic accidents made the news long before automobiles were invented.

Click here to read about some pre-auto mishaps.

The advent of the motor car caused just added to the mix, as shown by the March 1908 Gazette account below:

The above images from the 1985 York Daily Record story were supplied to the newspaper by Gary L. Klinedinst.

A few older folks might still remember the spectacular train wreck at Centerville, just outside of Glen Rock that Friday afternoon of April 2, 1920. A February 1985 York Daily Record article captured Rev. Millard R. Kroh’s vivid memory of the day.

Lewis Miller drawing showing himself, George Kuntz, and Dr. George Shaffner in a sleigh accident in 1831. Miller is retreiving Dr. Shaffner's wig.

There were no automobiles 130 years ago, but people still managed to accidentally harm themselves by other means of transportation--buggies, wagons, sleighs.... Many of the worst local accidents involved trains and resulting loss of body parts.

Some of the less gory accidents, as reported in the Gazette in late fall/early winter 1877 follow: