Great Northern Railroad Official Injured in Runaway Carriage
Maj. A. M. Anderson, a right-of-way agent for the Great Northern, suffers a broken collarbone after his team takes fright at a railroad crossing.
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.
Maj. A. M. Anderson, a right-of-way negotiator for the Great Northern Railroad, was seriously injured Saturday while traveling south of Oroville with Jas. E. Forde. As the team crossed the railroad tracks in town, a section hand approached pushing a handcar, causing the horses to bolt. During the ensuing panic, the lines parted and both men were thrown from the rig. While Forde escaped with bruises, Anderson struck a rail and suffered a broken collarbone. He was transported by a special train to Grand Forks and then to Spokane for treatment. It was noted that this was the Major's second serious runaway accident in two years, having been severely injured near Chelan previously.
“He bore his suffering with remarkable fortitude, and felt thankful that he escaped without more serious injury.”
The transition from horse-drawn transport to the railroad era was fraught with these kinds of local accidents. The 'runaway' was a ubiquitous, dangerous feature of life when the new infrastructure of the railroad met the older, unpredictable methods of river-valley transit.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.