A Toddler, an Axe, and a Sister's Terror at South Union
Left at play, a three-year-old swings an axe and maims her infant sister in a Thurston County farm accident that sends the child to the doctors and the older girl into hiding.
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.
A sad accident occurred yesterday at South Union. Four little girls, belonging to C. M. Lisk, were playing on the woodshed, when one of them but three years of age took the axe and began to chop on the wood block. The youngest of the children, a little girl but 18 months old, ventured too near the block, and as the axe descended, it chopped off the child's thumb and left the forefinger hanging. The child was brought to the offices of Drs. Riley and Newcomb, where it was cared for. The little girl who did the chopping was frightened almost into hysterics. She ran away and hid in the garden, and was not seen until evening, when her little sister was brought home from the doctor.
“The little girl who did the chopping was frightened almost into hysterics. She ran away and hid in the garden, and was not seen until evening.”
A century before childproofing and farm-safety warnings, an ordinary afternoon could maim a baby in seconds while the adults were elsewhere. The detail that lingers is the terrified three-year-old hiding in the garden, understanding only that something terrible had happened and that she had made it happen. It is a small, human tragedy of the kind that rarely made the front page but filled the local columns.
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