Reidy v. New England Tel. & Tel. Co.

• Decision Date: 27 September 1934
• Citation: 192 N.E. 218,288 Mass. 46
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court
• Parties: REIDY et al. v. NEW ENGLAND TELEPHONE & TELEGRAPH CO. (three cases).

288 Mass. 46

192 N.E. 218

REIDY et al.

v.NEW ENGLAND TELEPHONE & TELEGRAPH CO. (three cases).

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Hampshire.

Sept. 27, 1934.

Exceptions from Superior Court, Hampshire County; T. J. Hammond, Judge.

Three actions of tort by Elizabeth D. Reidy and by George B. Reidy and Josephine C. Reidy against the New England Telephone & Telegraph Company. Verdicts were ordered for the defendant. On exceptions purported to have been saved by plaintiffs.

Exceptions overruled.G. F. Leary and G. D. Cummings, both of Springfield, for plaintiffs.

J. N. Clark and Powers & Hall, both of Boston, for defendant.

RUGG, Chief Justice.

The plaintiffs seek to recover compensation for personal injuries and property damages received while traveling on a highway. Undisputed evidence introduced by the plaintiffs was to the effect that at about one o'clock on the afternoon of Columbus Day, 1926, the automobile in which they were riding collided with wires attached to a pole of the defendant which was lying in and not quite half way across the road; that the wires were not perceived by the driver of the automobile until too late to avoid contact with them; that about ten o'clock in the forenoon of the same day another automobile, being crowded off the road by an automobile going in the opposite direction, hit the telephone pole, broke it near the bottom, and it tipped about half way over and was about three feet from touching the road; that wires went from the top of this pole to other poles; and that the place of these occurrences was on the Enfield road about four miles from Ware.

The repair man of the defendant, called as a witness by it, testified that he lived in Palmer about fourteen miles from the place in question. He was not at work on October 12, 1926, because it was a holiday. When he went to work on the next morning, he received notice that there was trouble on the Enfield trunk lines, that they were noisy, and he went to the pole. He described the condition of the wires. He testified that the pole carried four trunk lines and one local line; that from the local line wires ran across the road to a house where there was no telephone service at the time; that these wires were broken off at the pole and no trouble existed or was reported on that line, that none of the Ware-Enfield circuits was broken but two of them had become ‘side crossed’ with the result that they were made noisy, and that the company would not know of any trouble with the wires in these circumstances unless an operator happened to use the lines, and that all calls between Ware and Enfield went over the lines on this pole; that the defendant had at Springfield a delicate piece of measuring machinery whereby, after trouble was reported, its general location might be determined; that on the holiday while he was away no one was in charge of repairs, and that, in case of reported trouble, the operators would try to get in communication with the local wire chief who...