Horrific Mill Accident Near Spokane
A sawmill proprietor is killed instantly after becoming caught in machinery while clearing a chute.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Word reached Spokane tonight that Bernard Pfeifer, of the firm of Pfeifer & Henry, proprietors of a large sawmill eighteen miles northeast of the city, was instantly killed at 5 o'clock this evening. Pfeifer was engaged in pushing the sawdust from behind one of the belts into a new chute just completed, when his clothing caught in the belt, and he was instantly beaten to death in the rapidly revolving flywheel, nearly every bone in his body being broken. He was well known and highly respected in the community in which he lived.
“his clothing caught in the belt, and he was instantly beaten to death in the rapidly revolving flywheel, nearly every bone in his body being broken.”
This tragedy reflects the brutal physical risks inherent in Washington's early timber industry. While modern workplace safety standards have evolved, the precarious nature of labor in the mills and woods remains a defining, often dangerous, part of the state's economic history.
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