A Near-Fatal Wagon Accident in Richland
A local farmer narrowly survives being run over by his own wagon after falling beneath his team of horses.
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.
Ole Hanson met with a painful accident which might have ended fatally. He was driving his wagon loaded with sacks of grain when the front tier slipped off, causing the driver to fall under the horses’ feet. Mr. Hanson, to save himself from the horses’ hoofs, got himself into such a position that the wagon wheel ran over his shoulder, causing a painful bruise. It is impossible for him to use his arm at all at the present time. It was only one chance in a hundred that his neck was not broken as he was right between the horses’ feet and in line for the wagon to run over him, and he thinks his luck is marvelous under these circumstances.
“It was only one chance in a hundred that his neck was not broken... and he thinks his luck is marvelous under these circumstances.”
While farm mechanization has made traditional wagon accidents a thing of the past, the hazards of agricultural work remain a primary concern for rural communities in the Columbia Basin, echoing the enduring dangers of manual labor.
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