Los Angeles herald., 1906-10-10
w ON AN
DRAGGED
BY HAIR
Thrilling Scene Is
Witnessed by
Scores
Narrowly Escapes Death
Beneath Horses
HOOfs
Mrs. Jessie Whitney Seriously Injured
In Remarkable Runaway Accident
Which Occurred on Central
Avenue

With the heavy braids of her long
black hair wrapped and meshed about
the whiffletrees, with her hands
grasping desperately at the torn and
battered strips of harness which flut-
tered like ribbons before the madly
showing through the tangle of flying
name and flashing limb, Mrs Jessie
Whitney OF 1124 East Adams street,
entangled by the harness of two run
away horses, managed to maintain
the hold which saved her life yesterday
morning for four long blocks in prob
ably the Widest and most terrible
ride in the history of the city.
The accident is without parallel and
the fact that Mrs. Whitney is alive
acts Of rescuers but to the woman's
cool determination which kept her
hand steady and her mind active where
another would have collapsed before
the horror.
Mrs. Whitney left home yesterday
shortly before noon.
Passengers Witness Tragedy
She went to drug store at East
Adams and Central avenue and had
started to cross to the southwest COR
ner when she was struck by the run
away team. e4t
How far the animals had been run
ming is difficult to say. They were
splendidly matched horses, light bay
and with markings of racers Evil
| dently alarmed at. some excitement
near Ascot park, they had torn loose
from the light road wagon to which
| they had been attached and with the
| long well paved avenue before them,
and with only the whiffletree to
hamper them and the flying harness
to frighten them to frenzy, the
| horses sped.
Block after block had swept past
them before they neared Adams street.
Up to that point there had been moth
ing to impede their progress but at
| the corner of East Adams Central
avenue car stopped right In the path
of the runawayS and like flash the
horses had turned and with tossing
heads had swept to one side and
darted west on Adams.
The passengers of that car had been
carefully watching the animals for
fear of collision and when the horses
swerved they breathed a sigh of re-
! lief. moment later they were hor-
rified to see a woman in the path of
the flying animals.
She was q small black-haired woman
whose hands were raised before her
face as though to ward off the i'm
pending blow. Only second and then
the horses had swept upon her. For
a moment the spectators held their
breaths expecting to see the body
| dashed to death beneath the keen,
polished hoofs. and then pedestrian
dashed toward the runaways and
leaped, but leaped in vain.
Dragged by the Hair
my God," he shrieked, as he stag
gered to his feet "she is caught in
the harness. she Is caught by the hair!"
And a glance was sufficient to cor
roborate that horrid truth. AS the
horses struck, the woman's hair had
been sent tumbling about her shoul-
ders and the heavy masses of black
fiber had wound and caught about the
flying whiffIetrees while the woman.
unable to Withstand or prevent was
Whipped from her feet and dangled
like plaything before the enraged
brutes.
Fighting desperately she grasped at
the harness. Her hands slipped and
a second time she grasped. burying
her finger nails in the hard glistening
muscles of the powerful chests before
her. Then with a wild scream she
| flung out her arms in a last desperate
effort and in a flash she had seized
a strip of dangling harness and
clutched at it.
And so they went; the great brutes
with tossing heads and flashing teeth;
the fral woman, dangling, clutching
desperately at a remnant of harness
while like the inexorable hand of fate
the whiffletrees lashed her about the
! head and shoulders as though to beat
her to death beneath the flying hoofs,
while it retained its grip In the mass
of her hair.
Behind them score of men, women
and children, screaming and crying
fearful yet anxious for the sight which
they knew must come. Time after
time, man or boy, Drawing DEATH
leaped from the sidewalks before the
horses. leaped for the tossing heads
and flying harness, only to be dashed
bleeding and injured to the streets
before the onslaught.
Hair Torn from Head
AS for the horses they shook their
| heads and struck at the body which
hampered them and bore them down
They bit and struck, but the light body
of the woman remained I'm place and
the slender hands. colled in the har-
ness, retained their grip
-Four blocks west of Central avenue,
one Of the horses stumbled. Just for
second, the long, clean limbed, brown
body trembled almost at standstill.
That second was enough, for the
pounding hoof had caught in the fly
ing garments and as the horse rlghted
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