The Sheriff's Bad Week
Prosser's Sheriff C.E. Duffy had a string of bad luck involving a broken axle, a horse-drawn rescue, and a smashed finger.
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.
Sheriff C. E. Duffy met with an accident, both to himself and to his car last Friday. While driving home to Prosser through the sand in the Fruitvale district, he broke the axle of his car and had to drive back to town behind a horse to get a man to go out to make the necessary repairs. To make matters worse, on his return to Richland, while trying to crank Doc Davidson’s new car he let the crank slip and smashed badly two of his fingers. So it looks as though the sheriff had troubles of his own enough to last him a while without the necessity of looking up any criminals or such like nuisances.
“It looks as though the sheriff had troubles of his own enough to last him a while without the necessity of looking up any criminals.”
Even a century ago, the transition from horse-and-buggy to automobiles created unique hazards—cranking a vehicle was notoriously dangerous work, and the sandy terrain of the Yakima Valley often proved fatal to early car axles.
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