Second Grade Crash
In Two Days Kills 1
J.E. Tennant, 67,
pumper for the Olson Oil Co., was killed at 8:56 a.m. Tuesday when his car was
struck by a Santa Fe passenger train at a crossing three miles west of
Burrton. In a similar accident at
Strandberg's Corner east of Hutchinson Monday afternoon, a York, Nebraska
trucker escaped injury when his semi-trailer truck was hit by Santa Fe train
No. 7.
In the Burrton
accident, Tennant, driving a 1931 Oldsmobile, apparently failed to see the
oncoming train until his car was on the track.
The automobile was demolished and Tennant was thrown five feet to one
side where his gasoline-soaked clothing caught fire and burned. Parts of his car were strewn along the track
for a distance of nearly a mile.
Tennant had been
living at the Olson camp west of Burrton.
Survivors include his wife, of the camp; a daughter, Mrs. Ollie Musick,
Burrton; a son Ernest, Burrton; and another daughter in Wichita. Undersheriff Walter Dixon and County Coroner
H.M. Stewart investigated the accident.
William Sinn, Newton, was the engineer on the east-bound train.
F. Staley, York, Neb., trucker, and an unidentified companion escaped injury Monday afternoon
when Santa Fe train No. 7 going 83 miles an hour, struck Staley's semi-trailer
truck at Strandberg's Corner, east of Hutchinson at 3:20 p.m.
The train virtually
demolished the rear end of the semi-trailer, but the cab part of the truck was
practically undamaged. Staley and his
companion escaped with a "shaking up." Part of the truck was wrapped around the
front of the locomotive and carried almost a mile beyond the intersection
before the train could stop.
The locomotive was
damaged enough so that a new engine had to be sent out to replace it. Sheriff O.W. Stapleton said the rear axle and
wheels of the truck were ripped off the body and thrown against a railroad
semaphore pole with such force that the pole snapped in two.
The Hutchinson News
Herald, Hutchinson, KS. June 19,
1945. Page 1.
