Anderson v. Akeley Lumber Company
| Decision Date | 24 August 1891 |
| Citation | 49 N.W. 664,47 Minn. 128 |
| Parties | Nels Anderson v. H. C. Akeley Lumber Company |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
A motion for a reargument of this case was denied October 7 1891.
Appeal by defendant from an order of the district court for Hennepin county, Smith, J., presiding, refusing a new trial after verdict of $ 2,000 for plaintiff in an action for a personal injury.
Order reversed.
Ripley Brennan & Booth, for appellant.
Steele & Rees, for respondent.
While the plaintiff was engaged as a servant of the defendant in operating a planing-machine in its mill, a large leather belt, by which the machine was driven, parted at the place where the ends of the leather strip were united to form the belt, and struck the plaintiff's elbow, causing an injury for which this action is prosecuted. The defendant is charged with liability for negligence in respect to the fastening of the belt above referred to, the alleged fault being not in the method employed, but that the fastening had been allowed to become and to remain insecure. We have come to the conclusion that the case did not justify a recovery, for the reason that it is apparent that the plaintiff knew and assumed whatever risk there may have been from the defect complained of. A brief statement of the case will show the reason for this conclusion.
One Godfrey was the defendant's foreman in this department of the mill, whose duty it was to personally repair defects of the nature of that complained of, when necessary. His duties and relations were such that it was ruled by the trial court and, as we are inclined to think, correctly ruled, that he stood in the place of the principal, as to the matter here in question, so that negligence on his part would be deemed to be the negligence of the defendant. Without further statement or comment upon that point, we assume this to be the proper principle applicable to that feature of the case. This belt was about four inches wide. The fastening referred to consisted of five brass hooks. The belt was at the side of the machine, fully exposed to view. It ran over a large pulley at one end of the machine, and over a small pulley, four or five inches in diameter, at the other. The motion of the belt was very rapid, -- about 30 miles an hour. The plaintiff was of the age of 24 years. He had been at work with such machines about a year and a half, and for a year before the accident he had been in charge of and personally operating one of them, handling the lumber as it was run into the machine, oiling it, setting it in motion, and stopping it, as occasion might require.
On the day of the accident, according to the testimony of the plaintiff, as he was about to start his machine in the morning, he observed that one of the...
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