A Boy’s Life Changed by Giant Powder
A teenage boy suffers a life-altering injury after a fishing accident with explosives in Lake Washington.
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.
Archie Hutcheson, aged 14, son of John Hutcheson, was fishing in Lake Washington yesterday with giant powder when a stick exploded, shattering his right hand, filling his face with powder and blowing his hat to pieces. He walked home three miles, and his hand was amputated above the wrist. He will recover.
“shattering his right hand, filling his face with powder and blowing his hat to pieces.”
While dynamite fishing is largely a memory, Lake Washington remains a site of perpetual conflict between recreational use and public safety. This incident, occurring when much of the lake's shoreline was still rural and industrial, reflects a time when dangerous explosives were dangerously accessible to civilians.
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