Herald and tribune. [volume] (Jonesborough, Tenn.) 1869-current, 1876-02-10
Fooling With Dynamite Re.
cent Cases in the Pennsyl-
- vania Oil R Rsgions.

ANU uamto eAplOSlOn at Dremerha,
ven hos interested the public in this pow,
erfal explosive. In the oil country nitro
glycerine is used daily either in fuse form
or adulterated, and known as dynamite
1t IS confined in tin cases, lowered intC
oil wells, and therc exploded the explo
sion opening the crevices of the rock, anc
causing the oil to flow more freely. 1t
handling it daily men become familiar
and careless, and consequently terrible
accidents are frequent. The power o.
this explosive is tremendous. A single
drop placed on an anvil and struck with a
hammer, is sufficient to burl the hammer
through the roof or crack the anvil.
The hrst explosion of nitro glycerine in
the oil region, which proved fatal to life,
was IN the infancy of the business. A
teamster was carrying several cans of the
article on his wagon from Titusvile to a
small village The road was rough
and stony, and he had been told to drive
with caution, as a slight conclusion will
explode the stuff. Soon after his depar,
ture an explosion shook the ground. At
Al
the distance of half mile the horses
were found. One had been killed, but the
other was uninjured. The wagon was in
splnters, and the iron was twisted and
broken. After a diligent search the
thumb and fore finger of the man were
found hanging to the limb of tree some
distance in the woods. Several hours
work discovered other parts of the body,
but all the remains collected of the un.
lucky teamster did not Eli cigar box,
In 1872 a family living on Dennis
Run, near Tidooute. was destroyed by
the explosion of a torpedo containing
dynamite. The family consisted of a
man and wife and child. The man was
moonlight torpedoist, or one who puts
torpedoeS into a we'll for which he had no
ratent. For doing this he was liable to
arrest and imprisonment. From the cir>
cumstances it was Inferred that he sas
holding the torpedo between bis legs, and
that while he was in the act of attaching
the head it exploded. His Shoulders
and head were thrown several hundred
feet in the air. The lower PORTIONS of
his body aud his extremities we're scat>
tered in every direction. His wife was
killed instantly, but her body was not
mutllated. Tue house in which they re,
sided was demolished. In the centre of
this destruction lay a little baby alive.
her only Injury being slight flesh wound.
In 1874 teamster, who was driving
load of nitro. lycerine from Parker to
Petro!ia. was killed by the explosion.
A portion of his face was found in the
top of tall pine tree, Que hundred feet
from the place of the accident. The re-
mainder of bis body was wholly destroyed.
Some months ago an old man who
owned well, and was unused to handling
torpedoes, pnt one of them down to the
depth of 800 feet, and was unable to
explode it. lie then let down another,
and for some reason this also failed to
explode. The old man became very
angry, and ran down a set of drilling
tools weighing several thousand pounds,
on top of the torpcdoes. The result was
told by himself as follows:
I'll hadn't no more than got out about
fifteen hundred feet of range before felt
the earth shake, and those tools shot IN
out of the hole, and the old we'll shouted
oil and water like all possessed. | thought
that I'd tapped the crust of the Internal
regions and released the fires of HI"