Fritz Spieker Accident, 1909

SPIEKER, ELTGROTH, SHARP, SCHENKELBERG

Posted By: David Reineke (email)
Date: 12/24/2005 at 11:39:42

I translated the following article from Der Carroll Demokrat, a German-language newspaper published in Carroll, Iowa, between about 1874 and 1920. It was originally published on Friday, 17 September 1909. Any information in brackets or notes at the end are my own explanations. It reads as follows:

On Friday evening, Mr. Fritz Spieker had a mishap in which his horses were frightened by an automobile. He was hurled from the wagon and his horses bolted away. The accident happened near the farms of John Eltgroth and Arthur Sharp. Upon hearing Mr. Spieker’s cries for help, these men rushed out and they found him sitting in the road bleeding from a wound to the forehead. Later, there was a search for the horses, and they were found a distance farther where they had run themselves out. Mr. Wilhelm Schenkelberg, who had just come along the road, took the injured man and his team and brought them home. Luckily, it later turned out that Mr. Spieker had received only slight injuries. Whoever has young, easily frightened horses, cannot be too careful on the public roads, especially at night, because he might encounter an automobile at almost any moment, and then there is usually an accident.