Mixon v. Pekin Cooperage Co.
| Citation | 170 S.W. 1163 |
| Decision Date | 23 November 1914 |
| Docket Number | (No. 7.) |
| Parties | MIXON v. PEKIN COOPERAGE CO. |
| Court | Supreme Court of Arkansas |
Appeal from Circuit Court, Greene County; J. F. Gautney, Judge.
Action by Roney Mixon, by W. D. Newson, next friend, against the Pekin Cooperage Company. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff appeals. Reversed and remanded.
Appellant sued to recover damages to compensate an injury sustained by him while employed at appellee's mill. His injury was sustained in about the following manner: He was employed about a stave planer in appellee's stave mill at Paragould, Ark., and his duty was to catch the staves as they emerged from the planer and place them on a wheelbarrow standing at hand. The planer machine sets east and west in the mill, and at the east end of the machine, where the staves emerged, a table stood, which was 32 inches long, 26 inches high, and 8 inches wide. At the east end of this table, and at right angles to it, a wheelbarrow stood. A feeder stood on the west side of the planer, through which the staves passed. When the staves emerged from the machine on the east side, they would drop upon the table placed there for that purpose. The plaintiff stood between the handles of the wheelbarrow at the east end of the table to catch the staves as they fell upon the table, to place them on the wheelbarrow. The machine was equipped with a pair of revolving knives, which were secured to a mandrel set in boxing in the machine. The upper knife was near the middle of the machine, and the bottom knife — the only one with which this case is concerned, being the knife upon which plaintiff was injured — was set some six inches from the east end of the machine. This knife was 7½ inches long, set on the mandrel in boxing 10½ or 11 inches wide. A metal plate, 5 inches wide covered the center of the knife, leaving about 2 inches exposed at each end. The staves passing over this knife would cover it up entirely. The table upon which the staves fell was a portable one, made so purposely, so that it could be removed without difficulty, and placed so that the knives could be adjusted as occasion might require. But, to keep the table in place during the operation of the machine, a strip of wood, or cleat, 12 inches long, 2 inches wide, and 1 inch thick, was nailed to the floor behind the table legs. While standing at the east end of this table, some 30 inches or more from the bottom knife, by which he was injured, and while in the act of pulling a stave from the planer, as it was emerging therefrom, appellant fell forward towards the machine and, throwing out his hand, in some manner inserted it in the boxing where the bottom knife was set, and under the stave which was passing from the planer, and so severely injured his hand as to require its amputation.
There was some evidence offered touching the practicability of placing a hood over the knives; but it was shown that this was not done in machines like the one upon which appellant was injured, and that issue has passed out of the case, and is not insisted upon as constituting negligence upon the part of appellee.
Appellant was an illitérate country boy, about 17 years old, at the time of the injury, and, when he was first employed by appellee, he was given employment rolling a wheelbarrow and "working a little bit at the heading planer"; but this employment was at the heading mill, and he went from there to the stave mill, where he was injured, after having worked a month or two at the heading mill. Appellant testified that he was standing between the handles of the wheelbarrow to catch the staves as they came out of the planer, and was placing them on the wheelbarrow, which came up just east of the table, and that the table was being kept in position by a strip of wood nailed to the floor, and that he did not know of the location of this strip or cleat until he stumbled over it. He testified further that the knife was located in a...
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