Donovan v. American Linen Co.
| Decision Date | 26 November 1901 |
| Citation | 61 N.E. 808,180 Mass. 127 |
| Parties | DONOVAN v. AMERICAN LINEN CO. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
J. W. Cummings, for plaintiff.
Jennings & Morton, for defendant.
This is an action for personal injuries. The accident occurred September 20, 1899. The plaintiff was a weaver in defendant's mill, and slipped and received the injuries complained of while passing down the main alley of the weave room, in which she worked, on her way out of the mill after it had stopped at night, and after the lights had gone out. The room was in the third story of the mill, and was lighted by electricity from a dynamo which was driven by the main engine of the mill, and which stopped when the engine stopped, though the momentum of the machinery kept the lights more or less bright for some minutes after the steam was shut off from the engine. The mill usually stopped at 6 p. m., and did so on the night of the accident, and the lights were usually out entirely by the time the plaintiff got to the place where she slipped on the night of the accident. The plaintiff was about 30 years old, and had been a weaver 16 years, and had worked in the defendant's mill two weeks. The conditions were the same on the night of the accident as when she went to work there and as on the other nights during the time that she had been there, except that the day had been dark and rainy, requiring artificial light almost all day; and when she reached the place where she slipped it was, as she testified, 'pitch dark.' On previous nights there had been sufficient natural light for her to see her way out. A track, consisting of two iron rails about 14 inches apart, rising 'not quite a quarter of an inch,--just a little bit above the floor,' as the plaintiff testified,--ran down the alley. It was a common track such as the plaintiff was familiar with, and was used for pushing back and forth a truck that contained material used in the room. The plaintiff did not know what she slipped on, but thought she slipped on an iron rail. At the close of the plaintiff's evidence the court directed a verdict for the defendant on its motion, and the case is here on the plaintiff's exceptions to that ruling and to another ruling in regard to evidence.
We think that the rulings were right. If we assume in the plaintiff's favor that the darkness caused her to slip then the gist of the plaintiff's case is...
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Hawkins v. Saint Louis & San Francisco Railroad Company
... ... 229; ... Railroad v. Jacobs, 81 S.E. 99; Price v ... Railroad, 77 Mo. 509-10; Donovan v. American Linen ... Co., 61 N.E. 808; Buehner v. Creamery Package ... Co., 100 N.W. 345; ... ...
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Curry v. Atlantic Refining Company
... ... v. Cadow, 120 Pa. 559 ... Plaintiff ... assumed the risk: Donovan v. American Linen Co., 180 ... Mass. 127 (61 N.E. Repr. 808); McCarthy v. Shoneman, ... 198 Pa ... ...
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Young v. Snell
... ... defendant ... ... Hannan v. American Steel & Wire Co., 193 Mass. 127, ... 78 N.E. 749, is another case of the same kind. There an ... Further, in our opinion this is not the case of a transitory ... risk, as in Donovan v. American Linen Co., 180 Mass ... 127, 61 N.E. 808, and McCann v. Kennedy, 167 Mass ... 23, ... ...
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...v. Carew Mfg. Co., 143 Mass. 470, 10 N. E. 308; Benson v. N. X., N. H. & H. R. R. Co., 26 R. I. 406, 59 Atl. 79; Donovan v. Amer. Linen Co., 180 Mass. 127, 61 N. E. 808. The verdict for the defendant was properly The petition for a new trial is denied, and the cause is remitted to the commo......