Erdman v. Deer River Lumber Co.

• Decision Date: 11 October 1910
• Docket Number: 3,316.
• Citation: 182 F. 42
• Parties: ERDMAN v. DEER RIVER LUMBER CO.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

182 F. 42

ERDMAN v. DEER RIVER LUMBER CO.

No. 3,316.

United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.

October 11, 1910

P. H Martin (C. D. O'Brien, on the brief), for plaintiff in error.

John I Dille (Cobb & Wheelwright, on the brief), for defendant in error.

Before HOOK and ADAMS, Circuit Judges, and REED, District Judge.

REED District Judge.

The plaintiff sued the Deer River Lumber Company, a Minnesota corporation, hereinafter called the defendant, to recover damages for a personal injury alleged to have been sustained by him because of the defendant's neglect. At the close of all the evidence the court, on motion of the defendant directed a verdict in its favor, upon which judgment was entered, and the plaintiff brings error.

The defendant owned and was operating a sawmill, and plaintiff was employed to work therein as a millwright; his duties requiring him to work in the nighttime. He alleges that the band saw and machinery about which he was required to work were not, because of defendant's neglect, sufficiently or properly guarded, or the mill sufficiently lighted, to protect workmen from injury while working around the same that in the performance of his duties while working in the mill, and without knowledge of its defectively guarded and insufficiently lighted condition, and because of such condition, one of his arms came in contact with the saw, and was instantly severed or cut off just below the elbow. The defendant denied any negligence upon its part, alleged that plaintiff assumed the risk of injury by entering and continuing in its service in the mill with knowledge and without complaint of its alleged unsafe condition, and that he contributed by his own neglect to the injury of which he complains.

The testimony shows without dispute that the band saw, and gearing or machinery which immediately operated the carriers for carrying the logs to and the boards from the saw, were inclosed in a housing which completely covered the same, and that they could only be reached or examined by opening a door in the wall of the housing and entering or looking therethrough; that upon the night in question a sprocket chain, which revolved upon a sprocket wheel or wheels within the housing, and located between the upright bands composing the saw, became displaced, the rolls stopped, and a signal was given by the sawyer to the plaintiff, whose duty it was to repair or remedy the same, to do so. Plaintiff in answer to this signal went to the housing, discovered, as he thought, that the sprocket chain was off the wheels, opened the door of the housing, put one arm inside, placed his hand upon or near to the sprocket wheel in an effort to replace or adjust the chain, and in doing so his arm came in contact with the rapidly moving saw and was immediately severed below the elbow; also that plaintiff was an experienced millwright, had been at work in and around the mill for some 3 weeks, and had worked some 18 months in a mill of like kind, except that it was a single instead of a double band saw; that he was familiar with this saw and the machinery by which it and the log and lumber carriers were operated; that upon the day preceding the night of the injury he had been within the housing, and observed and knew the location and movements of the saw and machinery therein, and had assisted in making some repairs thereto; that at the time of his injury the plaintiff had control of the movements of...