Tragedy at Lake Washington
A roller coaster at the end of the Madison street line collapsed, injuring a local carpenter and five young boys.
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.
An accident occurred on the roller coaster, on Lake Washington, at the end of the Madison street line, last evening, in which six persons were hurt, one of them probably fatally. Five of the persons injured were boys ranging in age from 12 to 15 years, and the sixth was a man, the builder of the coaster. Ever since the roller coaster was built several months ago it has proved anything but a success, and yesterday J. G. Lyons, the carpenter who built it, went to work to remedy the defects. At 5 o'clock last evening he wanted to give the coaster a trial and invited several boys who were passing to have a ride. Five boys, Bert and Edward Lewis, Gus and Frank Carlton and George Rockenfield, accepted the invitation and stepped into the car. After riding back and forth several times they started the car for another ride back. The boys all got in and Lyons gave it a push and then tried to jump on behind. His weight tipped up the front part of the car and lifted the front wheels off the track, and the vehicle, with its human load, pitched through the railing and plunged to the walk, twenty feet below.
“His weight tipped up the front part of the car and lifted the front wheels off the track, and the vehicle, with its human load, pitched through the railing.”
This 1892 disaster captures the unregulated enthusiasm of early amusement parks on Lake Washington. Today, the location remains a bustling part of the Madrona and Madison Park shoreline, though now strictly zoned for residential and public park use rather than experimental thrill rides.
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