Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 36, Number 102, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 August 1904 — INDIANA INCIDENTS. [ARTICLE]

INDIANA INCIDENTS.

RECORD OF EVENTB OF THE PAST WEEK. Man Brains Wife with Hatchett-Aero-ilont Falls to Death in Mancie —Rochester Cold Bterage Plant Hums - Convicts EsCupe Through Sewer. Singing “Nearer, My (Jiod. to Thee” to a child held ui ber arms, Mrs. George Baker of Hammond was felled by a blow from a hatchet in the hands of her husband. Repeatedly, it is said, the man struck the woman, and physicians report that her wounds will prove fatal. When the brutality of the crime became known there were muttering* of vengeance on the part of many citizens, which became so threatening that the police took double precautions to protect their prisoner. In an ante-mortem statement made to Chief of Police Cox and Prosecuting Attorney McAler at St. Margaret’s hospital the suffering woman told with difficulty the story of her fourteen years' unhappy married life, during which, she said, she had borne with brutality for her children’s sake. She said taker’s attacks on her life had been numbered by tho score since they were married in South Chicago in 1890. Twice before, she said, he attacked r her with a hatchet, and once with a carving knife. Aeronaut Killed in a Falf. Before several thousand people in Muneie Less Warren, a daring young aeronaut of Gainesville, Fla., was killed in a most tragic manner. Warren made a balloon ascension at Eaton park. He reached the height of three-fourths of a mile, when he cut his parachute loose. Like a rocket he shot toward the earth. The parachute failed to open, and the horrified spectators stood breathless as he shot through space. Warren fell like a human bullet, struck the top of a high trees, cutting the branches down with him. He struck the ground with' a sickening thud in the midst of women, who' fell fainting. His neck, both legs and right arm were broken. The bones from his leg protruded through the flesh and were driven, into the ground. Warren was 23 years old. Ilis body was shipped home. Packing Plant Is Burned. Fire destroyed Hazlett Brothers’ poultry packing establishment in Rochester. The blaze originated in a barn west of the main building, where eight horses, two mules and four wagonsebeavily loaded with eggs burned. Fanned by a brisk wind from the west, the fire spread to the office and cold storage and packing buildings, totally destroyed all of these, along with the big icehouse. The cold storage buildings were filled with SIO,OOO worth of poultry and eggs for this winter’s market. The buildings and equipment were valued at $25,000, all fully covered by insurance. Farmer Killed by Train. Lather H. Rogers, 57 years of &s/>, was instantly killed at Marion by a passenger train on the Pennsylvania Railroad. He was walking on the double track and became confused and stepped in front of the train. He is survived by a widow and four children. Convicts Escape by Sewer. The authorities have discovered that Parker and Gatewood, the missing prisoners from Jeffersonville, have escaped and are alive. They crawled 300 yards through the eighteen-inch sewer and then cut their way out. Their shirts were found in a cornfield. Short State Items. Anderson is enjoying a building boom. Two crazy men are terrifying farmers near Kokomo. j Marion people trying to locate a match factory. Elkhart City Council has passed an anti-spitting ordinance. Iron moulders are on a strike at the Eagle foundry, Muneie. Rex Buggy Company of Connersville is organizing a brass band. David W. Gregory, Hartford City, drew a bunch of Dakota land. Clarence Reaser, 24, was drowned at Marion in the Mississinewa river. N. M. Palmer, Frankfort contractor, was killed by failing from a building. Decatur people are trying to get the Clover Leaf terminal shops from Deiplios. Engineers are surveying for a proposed railroad from Richmond to Cleveland, Ohio. Dead carp in the river at Michigan City are causing the citizens to raise a great howl. Muneie is still oil crazy and almost all the money in the town is being invested in oil stock. • \ An Italian eoal miner was drowned while bathing in the Wabash river near Terre Haute. Louis Heck, a ear builder, was fatally shot by Jymes Mains, a Civil War veteran, at Jeffersonville. Three persons were injured when an Irvington trolley car collided with a Greenfield car in Indianapolis. Mrs. Sarah Carter, n negress of 60 years, was lojfeed in the Terre Haute jail, accused of attempting to poison her husband. An arch under the melting tank at the Diamond window glass factory at Marion collapsed ajid four workmen were seriously injured, one finally. John I). Hurt, a prominent and wealthy farmer living near Greencastle, committed suicide by ciittifig his throat. No cause is assigned for the act. John William Bell, aged 40, and Elmer, Cole, aged 26, both farmers, were drowned in gravel pits near Alexandria. Both had gone in to bathe and were stricken with cramps. Samuel Hoke of Elkhart filed suit against C. G. Conn’s Electric Company at Elkhart and the city of Elkhart to set aside franchise, ordinance and contract with the Conn company for electric lighting in Elkhart. Hoke alleges that the contract was signed on the day that the corporation waa created and la therefore void and that advertisements for bide for electric lighting would have saved the city $25,000. The attorneys for Hoke are the legal representatives of the Hen Island dam people who had the old light* Ing contract and who were underbid by the Oenn company.