Ross-Paris Co. v. Brown

• Decision Date: 25 January 1906
• Citation: 121 Ky. 821,90 S.W. 568
• Parties: ROSS-PARIS CO. v. BROWN.
• Court: Kentucky Court of Appeals

90 S.W. 568

121 Ky. 821

ROSS-PARIS CO. v. BROWN.

Court of Appeals of Kentucky.

January 25, 1906

Appeal from Circuit Court, Jefferson County, Common Pleas Branch Third Division.

"To be officially reported."

Action by Nora A. Brown against the Ross-Paris Company. From a judgment in favor of plaintiff, defendant appeals. Affirmed.

Forcht & Field, for appellant.

Bennett H. Young and M. W. Ripy, for appellee.

HOBSON C.J.

Nora Brown had been working for appellants in their laundry about six or seven months as an ironer. Her business was to iron ladies' clothes on a table and board. One morning the girl who worked at the mangle was absent, and the forewoman said to Miss Brown: "I wish you would go to the mangle as I am short of girls this morning." The mangle is a large roller through which the clothes are run. The mangle was out of order. It was not drying the work, and complaints were coming in from the linen room to the forewoman. Some half hour after Miss Brown went to the mangle the forewoman came to it, and saw that it was jumping and not running smoothly as it ought to run. She then said to Miss Brown "You go to Mr. Enny, the engineer, and tell him I say to please come and fix this mangle, because it needs fixing. There is danger about it." Miss Brown went to the engineer, who refused to come, and told her to tell the forewoman not to bother him about the mangle; that he was not going to fix it. She came back and told the forewoman what the engineer said, and thereupon the forewoman said to her "Go on there and work that mangle anyhow. Go on there and feed those napkins. Either do that or go." Miss Brown said: "All right; I will work"--and returned to the mangle and began feeding the napkins in it. In a short time, by reason of the defective condition of the mangle and its jumping as she was feeding a napkin into it, her hand was drawn into the machine. The hand was badly burned and torn. It was a question submitted by the physicians whether the hand could be saved; but it was finally concluded that by a secondary operation, taking the fingers off at the joints, the hand might be saved. This was done. She suffered very intensely. She was in bed about three months, and at the time of the trial a year afterwards had not been able to work any more. She could not bend her hand, and could only use her thumb. She was earning $14 a month at the time. She knew nothing about machinery, and, although she had worked at the mangle occasionally before, the danger of its use was not explained to her, and she did not know what was the matter with it. That the mangle was out of order, and had been for some days, and that this was known to her superiors, is pretty clearly shown. The jury found for her a verdict for $2,000, upon which the court entered judgment, and the defendant appeals.

It is insisted for the appellants that the court should have given a peremptory instruction to the jury to find for them, on the ground that the evidence showed that the plaintiff knew of the danger, and therefore could not recover. There would be great force in this, if the plaintiff had not been peremptorily ordered by the forewoman to go on with the work at the mangle. The rule is that, where a servant proceeds under the express orders of his superior in performing an act whereby he is exposed to unusual danger, and sustains an injury from it, the master is liable, unless the risk of the act was realized by the servant, or was so apparent that no man of ordinary prudence situated as he was would have undertaken it. Long's Administrator v. Illinois Central Railroad Company, 113 Ky. 806, 68 S.W. 1095, 58 L. R. A. 237, 101 Am. St. Rep. 374, and authorities cited. In the case at bar it is very clear that the girl whose business it was to iron at the table, did not realize the risk of...