Becker, William 1899 - 1915

BECKER

Posted By: Reid R. Johnson (email)
Date: 5/11/2013 at 15:24:52

Postville Review, Fri., 25 June 1915.

William, the 16 year old son of Mr. and Mrs. Joe Becker of Calmar, was instantly killed Wednesday morning between Calmar and Fort Atkinson when an auto he was driving overturned and rolled down a high embankment, crushing his life out beneath it.

As we learn it the Becker boy and Paul Ode, a lad of about Will's age, started out for a spin, Will driving his father's car. As they approached the place where the accident occurred the car got into a rut, and in steering out of the rut the car started up a steep embankment, and cramping the car too short to get back in the road it overturned and pinned the Becker boy beneath it, killing him instantly. The Ode boy jumped and escaped with but a few scratches.

Neither of the dead boy's parents were at home at the time of the calamity, the father being at Waterville and the mother at a barn raising near Castalia. We are told the parting injunction to the boy was not to take out the car during their abscence , even going so far as to disconnect the batteries, but boy-like they connected it up and went out for a ride, with results as above stated.

The dead boy is the son of Joe Becker, the gentleman who installed the heating system in Postville's new school.

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Submitter is not related.

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Added by Joy Moore Jan. 9, 2021

Source: Cresco Plain Dealer June 25, 1915 P-FP C-3

Fatal Auto Accident Near Calmar.
Will Becker, aged about 16, of Calmar, was killed Wednesday forenoon near Calmar, and a companion, Paul Ode, about the same age, injured somewhat, by the overturning of an auto driven by the former lad. The parents of the boy were both out of town and in their absence had forbidden the boy to take out the car, but he disobeyed them and drove the car to Fort Atkinson and on the return trip when about one-half mile east of Fort Atkinson the car, driven at a high rate of speed, left the road, struck a stump and was overturned, the steering wheel pinning the Becker boy to the ground.

Transcriber's Note: Find a Grave shows he was born June 12, 1899 and died June 22, 1915. He is buried in St. Aloysius Cemetery.

St. Aloysius Cemetery
 

Winneshiek Obituaries maintained by Jeff Getchell.
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