Two Gas Explosions in the Franklin Mine Kill the Pit Foreman

Two small explosions of gas occurred in the Franklin coal mine of the Oregon Improvement Company yesterday afternoon, resulting in the death of P. B. Robinson, the pit foreman, and the serious injury of five and slight injury of four men. News of the explosion was immediately telegraphed to Superintendent Corey and General Manager Smith, and the former left for the scene on last evening's train.

Franklin, June 27.—Special.—An explosion occurred at 3 p. m. in the new slope driven from the seventh level to connect with the sixth level of the main slope of the Franklin coal mines. The morning shift had quit work at 2:30 p. m. and reported to the afternoon shift that there was no gas, but just before leaving had set off two shots. The 3 o'clock shift had gone to work and got nearly to the face of the slope, which is up about eighty feet, when an explosion of gas occurred. Five men were burned at this time. They came out of the gangway to go home, and sent for Pit Foreman P. B. Robinson. He came immediately and saw that the men were gotten out.

He then started for the scene of the explosion. When he reached there, he picked up a door that had been blown down and was holding it, when another explosion occurred, about one hour after the first. It tore down the door, broke Robinson's arm and injured his spine, and he was also badly burned about the face and head. He was brought to the top immediately and carried home, and medical aid was summoned, but he died at 7 o'clock this evening.

He leaves a wife and four small children, the eldest about 10 years.

Of the others five are badly and four slightly injured.

Badly burned: Charles Johnson, W. F. Johnson, Charles Anderson.

Slightly burned: Alf Linquist, August Johnson, Charles Leander.

Paul Boyd slightly bruised.

W. H. Cleaver, colored, slightly bruised and burned.

Park Robinson's name is familiar to the people of this state from the leading part he took in the riot at the Franklin mine on June 28, 1891. He was a tall, muscular man, all bone and muscle, and was noted as a dead shot, his fame as a marksman having spread from Dakota, where he had served as a deputy sheriff. On the evening of Sunday, June 28, 1891, the train which had carried a number of the colored miners to Newcastle was returning to Franklin when a general fusillade between the strikers in the brush and the guards on board the train, and at the same time another party of miners began to descend the hill toward the row of houses occupied by Robinson and the other mine houses. Robinson, seeing them approaching through a clump of woods behind his house, rushed in and seized his rifle. He fired at the two foremost and instantly killed one man named Morris and mortally wounded another named Williams, who died next morning. The grand jury which met soon after to inquire into the riot indicted him for manslaughter, and he was tried and acquitted on the ground that he killed the men in defense of his home. He made a trip to Dakota soon after, and ultimately returned to Franklin, where he has since been working.