People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 August 1893 — FIVE MEN KILLED. [ARTICLE]

FIVE MEN KILLED.

Terrible Effect of the Explosion of a Thrashing Machine's Boiler. Newark, 0., Aug. 2.—An accident fatal to five men occurred Monday night at the farm of Louis Pierson near Homer. Luther Sillen and John Kittle, owners of a thrashing outfit, were at work on Pierson’s farm thrashing his wheat. Water was allowed to become too low and the boiler exploded. Five men were instantly killed and four others probably fatally injured. The force of the explosion blew the engine into a stack of straw near the separator, igniting it. Upon the arrival of help the separator, grain, straw and wagon were all in flames and the remains of the dead were burned and charred into unrecognizable masses. The dead are: John Kittle, Norman Sellen, Janies Bowers, John Bell and Frank Bell.