Chambers v. Wampanoag Mills
| Decision Date | 29 November 1905 |
| Citation | 75 N.E. 1093,189 Mass. 529 |
| Parties | CHAMBERS v. WAMPANOAG MILLS. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Elisha Greenhood, for plaintiff.
Richd. P. Borden and Robt. C. Davis, for defendant.
This is an action of tort for injuries sustained by the plaintiff while in the employ of the defendant. At the trial in the superior court the jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff and the case is before us on the defendant's exception to the refusal of the presiding judge to rule that there was no evidence which would warrant a finding for the plaintiff.
The plaintiff was employed to run eight looms, four in a row on each side of a narrow alley. While at work at the fourth loom in one row, he was struck in the eye by a shuttle with the usual pointed metallic end, which flew upwards between the hand rail and the shuttle guard of his second loom; the shuttle guard being so swollen or 'bellied out' from the face of the hand rail, or 'reed cap,' as the front of the lathe sword is called, that the guard failed to fulfill its sole function of preventing a shuttle from leaving its proper course, flying upwards, and striking the operative. Both the plaintiff and the defendant knew that, from one cause or another, a shuttle sometimes leaves, or attempts to leave, a loom in operation, and that the function of the guard, which is placed on all looms, is as above stated. The guard consists of a piece of metal, about one quarter of an inch in diameter and of the length of the path of the shuttle between the two shuttle boxes, which length is paractically the width of the body of the loom. The guard is parallel with the hand rail, and, when of proper length and construction and in proper position and adjustment, is for most of its length nearly the width of a shuttle distant from the hand rail; but toward each end it turns at right angles to the hand rail then runs closer to and parallel with the hand rail toward the ends of the loom, and at each end a loop is formed to receive a bolt which runs through the hand rail and is tightly fastened by a nut. Often there is a leather strap around a guard at its centre screwed to the hand rail. The guard should be directly over the outer portion of the path of the shuttle as it flies along the race board from one side or shuttle box of the loom to the other.
The plaintiff contends that at some time prior to the accident the old guard became broken, and, the plaintiff having called the attention of the loom fixer of his section to the fact the loom fixer put a new shuttle guard on the loom, from which the shuttle flew which caused the accident, and that such new guard was too long, and for that reason 'bellied out.' On direct examination the plaintiff testified that he was 28 years old; that he learned to weave when 14 years old, then worked as a weaver about a year, and subsequently about 10 months before the accident, resumed the occupation on the eight looms above mentioned. At the request of his counsel, using a model, he explained the names and functions of some of the parts at the front of a loom, illustrating its forward and backward movements and the way in which a shuttle ordinarily travels. He also testified that the average speed of a loom was about 180 or 190 picks a minute, a pick corresponding to a single movement of the shuttle across the loom, the shuttle being struck by one picker, and then being struck by the other, returning; that there never is occasion for taking off a shuttle guard unless it is broken or improperly put on; that it is a permanent part of the machine, a part with which he, as a weaver, had nothing to do; that it was not part of his work to put it on, or to assist in putting it on, or to examine it in any way; that a man called a loom fixer has charge of a section of looms, and it is the fixer's business to keep the looms in his section in repair; that when a fixer goes to a loom to fix anything, the weaver is supposed to run his other looms, giving no assistance or directions, and it was not a part of his work to examine anything the fixer has done when the fixer has finished--'I wouldn't know anything about it anyway'; that there were about 600 looms in the room in which he worked, being three sections and a part of another; that the shuttle guard and the lathe go back and forth all the time except when the loom is stopped; that each loom stops about every three minutes throughout the day because the filling runs out, that is, the shuttle becomes empty of yarn, and it is the work of the weaver to fill and replace the shuttle as soon as possible, 'which takes only a couple of seconds, unless there is a thread out to draw in,' during which operations...
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