St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1893-02-13

native of Lebanon, N. H., was fore
man of gang of men who were en-
gagged in blasting rock at Cavendish,
Vt. Gage had never had days i'll
ness from childhood, and was, as Tar as
could be determined, perfectly healthy.
AT the time of the accident, on Sept.
Is. 1913. he was charging drill-hole 1or
blasting, aud sat on a shelf of rock just
above, but trifie to the right of the
hole, as he faced it. The powder aud
fuse were in position, and he was in the
act OF tamping it in. He turned his
head for an instant to look at his men at
work behud him. His iron struck fire
Oh the edge of the hole, an explosion
followed. and the tamping bar, three
feet seven inches long, One-fOurth inch
at the small end, about one and one
fourth inches at the large end, and
weighing about fourteen pounds, was
projected upward obliquely in the line
of its axis, passing completely through
his head and high into the air, falling
several rods behind him. and was after
ward picked up by one of the men, COW
cred with blood and particles of brain.
The man was thrown upon his back
by the force of the blow and his eX-
tremitieS moved cOnvulSively a few
times, but he spoke in a few minutes.
His men carried him TO the road short
distance away. and he rode home in an
OX-cart sitting up by being supported.
When he arrived at his destination he
got out of the cart himself with little
assistance, and an hour afterward
walked upstairs with little aid and lay
down upon the bed, where his wound
was dressed. He was conscious, but
very weak from loss of blood.
The examination of the wound showed
that the iron entered the left side of the
face by the pointed end, Immediately
anterior to the angle of the lower jaw,
passed obliquely backward emerging
i'll the median line, back of the frontal
bone, near the coronal suture. The
bones were broken in small fragments
and forced upward and outward. The
hole had much the shape of all inverted
funnel, the edges of the scalf everted
and the frontal bone badly fractured,
leaving an irregular oblong opening in
the skull two inches one way and three
and half the other. through which the
pulSatiOnS of the brain were distinctly
seen and felt.
The wound was dressed, and the man
showed no apparent signs of serious in
jury excepting curious agitation of
the legs, which were alternately re-
tracted and extended. Then began a
battle. the natural consequences of such
an accident against the strong cOnstitu-
ton of a healthp man. No one thought
it possible that he could recover, but
after few days he began to improve,
and the fifty-siXth day from the accident
the patient was up and walking about
the house and piazza. The sixty-fourth
day he caught cold, and serious cOnse-
quences were, for time, feared. but he
recovered.
After that Gage was in good health
and flesh, but in his mind was weak and
childish, and the sight of the left eye
was entirely lost. He visited South
America, passed some time in Valpa-
raise. then went to San Francisco, where
his mother had moved. He died there
of epilepsy May 81. 1861, nearly thir-
teen years after the accident. The
skull and iron are now in the museum
of the medical department of Harvard
university.