Tragedy at the Riverbank
A six-year-old boy playing near the family slough was swept away when the bank suddenly collapsed into the water.
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.
Albert, the six-year-old son of Mr. and Mrs. B. O. Tooke, was drowned about four o'clock Tuesday afternoon near the family home about six miles up the river. The little fellow, with his brother and sister, were playing along a slough which runs through the Tooke farm when a portion of the high bank caved in carrying the boy with it. The other children hastily summoned their father who was at the scene of the accident within a few minutes, but as the water in the slough is deep and the under-current strong at this time of year, he was unable to recover the boy's body for more than half an hour. Every effort was made to resuscitate the little fellow, but to no avail. Funeral services were conducted Wednesday morning at the family home by Rev. W. P. Osgood, of the Baptist church.
“The water in the slough is deep and the under-current strong at this time of year.”
Accidents involving the treacherous, shifting banks of the Columbia and Yakima rivers were a frequent source of tragedy for early settlers. Even today, despite modern river management and public awareness campaigns, these water bodies remain deceptively dangerous, claiming lives annually during the spring runoff.
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