George Payne,Alfred Petterson,Inglebret Ingle&Axel Osterlund

PAYNE, PETTERSON, INGLE, OSTERLUND

Posted By: Dorian Myhre (email)
Date: 5/19/2011 at 20:04:16

From Story County Watchman October 18, 1895

Fire At Summit.

Fire broke out Friday evening at 8 o'clock in the Summit Hill coal mine, four miles south-west of Story City. The shaft took fire from the furnace at the lower end. Four men and a mule were shut in the rooms below by the fire. All the miners above and in the surrounding country worked hard all night and all day Saturday to rescue the entombed men, but did not get the fire under control till Saturday near dark. All four men and the mule were dead and had been for some time when found. The dead are:

GEORGE PAYNE, Des Moines,
ALFRED PETTERSON, Des Moines,
INGLEBRET INGLE, Roland, Story County,
AXEL OSTERLUND, address unknown.

Men had been working night and day to complete an air shaft as quickly as possible. This had been sunk to within six feet of the coal and there remained but thirty feet of excavation below to make the connection. In the meantime a furnace near the bottom of the main shaft was used for the purpose of circulating air for the benefit of the miners. About 7 o'clock p. m. the shaft caught fire about twenty or thirty feet from the bottom, where upon the prisoners gave the signal to be hoisted. This was attempted but the heavy steel cable was so intensely hot that it failed to hold the cage, and was snapped in two. Efforts were at once made to extinguish the fire, and the prisoners retreated as far as possible from the shaft and began building a "stopping" by means of a barracade. They succeeded in building over four feet high and lacked but about eighteen inches of completion when the smoke presumably caused their suffocation. As soon as possible their bodies were extricated, which was completed at 5:55 p. m. Saturday. The funerals were held Monday.

Three of the unfortunate men were unmarried, while Payne leaves a wife and three children without a provider. Ingle is a member in good standing of a Des Moines lodge of Odd Fellows.

The damage to property of the mining company is conservatively estimated at $3,500 to $4,000, while the delay at this season of the year will cause a very heavy loss.

County Coroner Dr. A. S. Aplin held an inquisition over the bodies of the four men. Nicholas Kiefer, William Smith, and Jacob Moser were summoned as jurors, and the following witnesses were examined: F. A. Hill (superintendent of the mine), Dr. C. W. Allen, Samuel Ellsworth (mine boss), James Ellsworth, W. S. Johnson, C. M. Johnson, Walter Nelson and William Williamson. The jury brought in a verdict to the effect that Axel Osterlund, Inglebret Ingle, George Payne and Alfred Petterson came to their death on Friday, October 11, 1895, by suffocation caused by fire in the mine shaft of the mine. No charge of blame nor credit of exoneration appeared in the verdict.