Quick v. Minnesota Iron Co.

• Decision Date: 19 November 1891
• Citation: 47 Minn. 361
• Parties: JOHN QUICK, Administrator, <I>vs.</I> MINNESOTA IRON COMPANY.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

47 Minn. 361

JOHN QUICK, Administrator,vs.

MINNESOTA IRON COMPANY.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

November 19, 1891.

Appeal by defendant from an order of the district court for St. Louis county, refusing a new trial after a trial before Stearns, J., and verdict of $2,000 for plaintiff, in an action for negligence resulting in the death of plaintiff's intestate, James Quick.

Draper, Davis & Hollister, for appellant.

McGindley & Cotton, for respondent.

GILFILLAN, C. J.¹

Action for injuries to plaintiff's intestate, from which he died, caused, as alleged, by the negligence of the defendant. The deceased was in the employment of the defendant as a miner. The defendant, in its business of mining ore, had sunk a vertical shaft about 300 feet deep. Along this, at intervals, were what are called "levels," being horizontal excavations or tunnels extended from the shaft to reach the ore. Of these there were four, the fourth being, as we understand, at the bottom of the shaft. The first and second from the top had been abandoned; the third was still being worked; and the miners were working at and preparing the fourth. In the shaft was what is called a "cage," being, as we understand, a lift or elevator, running up and down between the bottom of the shaft and the surface, and used for carrying tools and machinery and hoisting dirt, and frequently for carrying the men to and from their work in the shaft or levels. It was customary with defendant, as with all mining companies working by means of such shafts, when opening a new level, to excavate around the sides of the shaft a road-way or passage for the men to pass from one side of the shaft to the other without crossing it. A bell at the surface, with a line extending down to the different levels, was used, according to a prescribed code of signals, of one, two, or three taps, to call for the ascent and descent of the cage. At the time of the killing of the deceased the defendant had not made the road-way around the shaft at level 4, and had not extended the bell line from level 3 to level 4, so that the only means for those working at level 4 to indicate when they desired the cage to be let down or drawn up was to call to the men at level 3, and they signaled by the bell to those running the cage. The deceased had been at work for defendant in other shafts and this shaft five or six months, and about two weeks excavating this shaft between level 3 and level 4. It was necessary for the men working at the level to go from time to time to the other side of the shaft, and, there being no road-way, they had to go across the shaft in order to do so. While crossing on one of these occasions, deceased was killed by the cage, which ran without noise, coming down upon him. He had previously called to the men at level 3 to signal for the cage to be let down, and it had been let down three times, and at the last of the three times he had called to them to have it drawn up, and not let down...