People's Pilot, Volume 4, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 December 1894 — INSTANT DEATH. [ARTICLE]

INSTANT DEATH.

It Comes to Many Men Through a Boiler Explosion. West Bay City, Mich., Dec. 19. Tuesday noon a boiler in the box factory of Russell Bros, exploded because of low water. The shock of the explosion was felt throughout the city. A number of employes were seated in the engine room at the time eating lunch. Five were killed outright, one is missing and supposed to be Under the debris, and three were badly injured. The dead are: John Calcutt, aged 24 years; George Pfund, aged 17; Albert Rahn, aged 36; John Brann, aged 15, and Al Hearenbacher, aged 17. The injured are Fred Wildanger, Charles Dodge and Roe Hudson. The dead were terribly mutilated, one man having both legs blown off and his neck broken.* One ghastly find was that of a headless trunk. The debris of the mill was thrown over 500 feet and all the windows in the neighborhood were shattered by the shock. Haining, the engineer, professes entire ignorance of the cause of the accident. He denies that the water was low in the boiler. Experts say that the boiler, which was twenty-eight years old, was practically ruined and rotten. Every expert who has examined the surroundings, declared. that the explosion was due to low water.