Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 12, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 April 1893 — Gray-Haired at Sixteen. [ARTICLE]

Gray-Haired at Sixteen.

“What cauSed my hair to turn gray so early in life, did you ask?” said the genial Mr.. Anderson in the rotunda of the Southern in answer to a question. “When I was a lad of sixteen years it was common sport to coast down Morgan street to the Lwee. In February of that year there was a sleet and a snow storm similar to this, and many small and some larger boys were enjoying the sport of dying down that steep declivity. I tools

a turn and had borrowed a sled for the purpose. Lying on my stomach, the sled was given a start by a comrade and it fairly flew down the slippery track. As the sled neared the foot of Morgan street, across which a train was passing, I heard the puff, the puff an engine, and knowing I was rushing toward it like the wind, my presence of mind forsook me and I lost all control of the sled. Shutting my eyes And clinching the sled tighter with my hands while I breathed a good-bye to all my friends, concionsness left me, and when it returned I was lying on a bench in one of the saloons on the levee and a crowd of men and boys were grouped around me, I was unhurt, having passed under the car at such a rate of speed that the trucks failed to catch me. Upon rising from tho bench and glancing in tho mirror over the bar, I noticed that my hair, formerly so black and gloss/, had turned to almost snowy whiteness.”—[St. Louis Republic.^