Chapter 11     TOUCHES WITH DEATH

I'm going to do a little recording of accidents that happened during my life until about 1952.

The first accident I remember was while living in Ramah in 1916. My uncle had a well about thirty feet deep, welled up for about two feet above the water. We'd lost the well bucket down in the well and it stayed on these rocks at the side of the well. Mother and my aunt decided that I'd go down on the rope and retrieve this bucket. I put my foot in a loop at the end of the rope, got ahold of the rope at the pulley and started down with the help of Mother ,Joy Davis and my aunt. They were going to let me down in the well to retrieve the bucket. I hadn't anymore than got over the curb of the well until this, chain that I had my foot in on the end of the rope slipped off. I proceeded to fall 35 feet into the water, missing the bucket oh the side of the well and going down without hitting the rocks. It was about the coldest water I had ever experienced. I thought I would drown before I got back up out of the water. I came to the top and crawled up on the rocks. It seemed ages before anyone came to the top of the well to let the rope down to help me out. They all got scared and ran for help when the rope got loose and I fell into the well.

Another experience happened about 1924. In 1920 we moved over to Fort Wingate to work for the government. While working there we were hauling coal from the railroad station up to Fort Wingate, which was about three miles. We'd take the trailers down and spot them at the railroad track. After the trailers were loaded we'd take the tractors back down and hook on to the loaded trailers and pull them back up to the Fort, two men being on each tractor. So my helper and I started out on one tractor with another driver and helper right behind us. We started down to the station after a load of coal. On our way down we had to cross a bridge over a wash about twenty feet deep. It was a long bridge, probably 100 or 150 feet long. I drove the tractor out on this bridge going about twenty miles an hour without any trailers behind. I got almost across the bridge when it collapsed behind me. The far end of the bridge fell into the bottom of the wash making a steep ramp. It was so steep that before I could get control of the tractor it rolled backwards under the bank. I realized the other tractor was right behind us and going the same speed we were and that it would come in right on top of us. Our tractor hadn't any more than stopped under this bank until the dirt from the other tractor started trickling down over our heads. We looked up and could see the front end of this tractor hanging out over the end of the bridge right over the top of us when the driver got the tractor stopped. No one was hurt and no damage done except for the fall of the bridge.

The next accident was on New Year 's morning in 1921. Each one of the drivers working for the Motor Transportation Division would take turns on a holiday and carry the mail. Pick up the mail bag at the Fort Post Office and take it down to the railroad station and hang it for the train to pick up as it came flying through. A sergeant rode down with me and the captain who was in charge of of the fort at that time rode down part way and then got out to hunt rabbits. Then the two of us went on down to hang the mail. The train was right on time and we could see it coming down the track. We paid no attention to the track leading the other way and and didn't expect another train to be coming that way when we could see the train coming from the west. The road crossed the track and as we drove onto the track and got right in the middle the sergeant sitting along side of me said, "Oh hell!", and he fell down in my lap, which saved his life. About that time the train coming from the east, a freight train, picked us up and took us down the track for about one-half or three-quarters of a mile. The automobile, a Dodge touring car, was bent right around the front end of the train and picked up clean off the track. I didn't realize we were on the train, at .the time. I thought if I could turn the wheels I could get in the clear and get across the track. But we were already down the track a half-mile at that time. The sergeant had two or three broken ribs, a broken arm and a broken leg. 1 received no injuries, only a little cut on my forehead from the broken windshield and the shock afterwards. After I watched them carry the sergeant away the man came back that carried him away and said the sergeant would not live. Being a very good friend of mine I went into shock and lay in the hospital for about ten days. I took this same trip over and over. Every time I'd close my eyes I'd ride the freight train over that same piece of track again.

As the work went on around the Fort with that many men working with machinery accidents will occur. We were up on the mountain grading some road for the county with a big ten-ton tractor. The old bridges that had been built for teams and wagons didn't support such heavy equipment, but we didn't inspect this bridge. I drove out onto this bridge, it wasn't too long, but as I got about halfway the bridge broke right in two in the middle and fell straight down into the bottom of the creek with the tractor still on top of the bridge. Still no one was hurt and everything came out in good shape.
No serious accident happened to me then until about 1952. i was working at the Bureau of Public Roads garage in Phoenix, located at the Indian School, and just installed a new electric welding machine that required a 440 volt wire to be run out to the service pole. The electrician at the Indian School told me when I got the wires out there to go ahead and hook them up. I got the wires run out to the pole and called him. He said, "You go ahead and tie these wires onto those three wires out there, and there's nothing to hurt you."

And I said, "Maybe I'll do something wrong, maybe I'll get electrocuted."

"No, just tie those three wires onto those other three wires. There'll be no danger whatsoever."

So I got up on this pole and fastened all these wires together with my bare hands. I was on top of one house and had put a ladder on top of this house up to the top of the service pole. I did put a safety belt on. So as I fastened these wires together with my bare hands and nothing happened. I tightened them all up with my fingers, reached back on my belt for a wrench, and when I went to tighten these wires with that wrench, the electricity grabbed the wrench and there I was locked to this wire.

How many volts were going through me I didn't know, but I knew if I didn't get loose from this wire, I'd die right there. All the other men had gone to lunch, I was there by myself up on this pole. One of the men said he heard me scream as the shock hit, but I don't remember ever making any sound. I knew if I didn't get loose from this wire that I'd never make any sound, so I kicked around with my feet. I thought a loose wire had got on the ground and on my feet in some way and was causing me to be grounded on this pole. Anything I could do didn't seem able to stop this shaking and vibration through my body. I finally decided here's where I would expire, right here on this pole, because I heard the last gurgle in my throat, like you hear when a man is dying.

About that time I had a funny experience. For about, I don't know how many seconds but it couldn't have been but a few split seconds, I stood back on this house and I could see my body standing up on that ladder still on this pole, just as plain as if I was looking into a mirror.

Then about that time the shock stopped. The electricity was cut off for some reason, nobody seemed to know why. I lowered myself back down on the house. The men on the ground wanted to know if I needed some help. I said, "No, I just need a few minutes rest. Then I'll be able to bring myself down." No one came up on top of the house to help me, so I went down and was taken to the hospital. My arms were bandaged up and I drove myself on home then. But it was about three and a half months before I went back to work on account of my burned fingers where I was in contact with the hot wire.
I often wondered, since these serious accidents where I could have been killed three or four times, what the outcome will be. Will it be just stuir.ble and fall down, heart attack or maybe just any kind of an accident? I've often thought about these things, if a person ever realizes or could prevent himself from being killed when his time comes. I don't think there's any set time for anyone to lose his life, but he can speed it up by causing accidents that could be prevented if we take more caution in the way we handle ourselves on the job.

This brings us up to about 1952 on this rambling around. I hope somebody will enjoy it and can get something out of these stories.