Vannatta v. Lancaster Light & Power Co.

• Decision Date: 14 November 1916
• Citation: 159 N.W. 940,164 Wis. 344
• Court: Wisconsin Supreme Court
• Parties: VANNATTA v. LANCASTER LIGHT & POWER CO.

164 Wis. 344

159 N.W. 940

VANNATTA

v.LANCASTER LIGHT & POWER CO.

Supreme Court of Wisconsin.

Nov. 14, 1916.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Grant County; George Clementson, Judge.

Action by Teresa E. Vannatta against the Lancaster Light & Power Company. Judgment for defendant dismissing the complaint, and plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

This is an action to recover damages for the death of plaintiff's son caused by his coming into contact with a high-tension electric wire of the defendant company.

The circuit judge fully states the facts of the case in his written decision upon defendant's motion to change the answers of the jury to the second, third, fourth, and fifth questions as follows:

“The plaintiff was the mother of Iris Clifford Vannatta, who was killed on August 13, 1915, while on the iron highway bridge that crosses Little Platte river about half a mile north of the city of Platteville, by a discharge of electricity from a transmitting wire of the defendant that diagonally crossed above said bridge near its northern end. * * * At the close of the plaintiff's testimony the defendant's attorneys moved the court to direct a nonsuit. This motion was overruled. At the close of the testimony a motion was made by the defendant's attorneys to direct a verdict for the defendant. This was likewise overruled, and questions for a special verdict were submitted to the jury. * * *

The special verdict was in substance as follows: (1) That Iris Clifford Vannatta came to his death while he was on the top of a 16-foot high truss of said bridge through a charge of electricity from a live wire of the defendant company that diagonally crossed said bridge about 22 feet above the floor of the bridge and over 6 feet above the top of said truss; (2) that defendant was negligent in so constructing its wires over this bridge; (3) that the manager of the defendant company, as a man of ordinary care and experience in the erection of poles and wires for carrying electricity, ought reasonably to have foreseen, under the attending circumstances, that as a natural and probable consequence of so carrying said wires over this bridge injury might occur to a person on the bridge who was using ordinary care for his own safety; (4) that no want of ordinary care on the part of the deceased contributed to produce his death; (5) that the plaintiff was entitled to receive $4,000 for the death of her son. * * *

This case was remarkable in this, that there was no material conflict in the evidence. The undisputed facts of the case are as follows:

The plaintiff at the time of Clifford Vannatta's death was 68 years old. Clifford at that time was 18 years of age, and nearly 6 feet tall. He was her youngest child, and lived with her. She received his earnings and supported him. He had no special employment, but worked at various jobs. He received for his work $2 a day. The plaintiff had seven other children, all of them married. At the time of this unfortunate accident she was visiting with one of them in Dakota.

The bridge in question on the Platteville and Lancaster highway is constructed wholly of iron, excepting the floor of the bridge, which is of wood. It is 90 feet long and 14 feet wide. The iron trusses at the sides rise to the height of 16 feet from the floor of the bridge. In each truss there are iron uprights rising from the bottom of the bridge 16 feet to the flat top of the truss. These uprights are made of iron beams 16 feet long, connected together with latticework irons; the uprights being 8 inches in diameter. The two trusses are fastened together at the top with crossbeams and truss rods; also by cross braces or rods three-quarters of an inch in diameter which go diagonally from the top of one truss to the top of the other. The highway is made to slant up to each end of the bridge.

The defendant company receives its electricity for lighting and power from a generating plant at Galena, conducted through the city of Platteville, which also receives its electricity from the same source. The defendant was authorized to use the public highway from Platteville to Lancaster by the towns through which the highway runs for the purpose of setting poles, for the attachment of its wires for transmitting electricity. The work of constructing this line was finished late in 1914, and the current then began to pass over it. The poles used were of Idaho cedar, 35 feet long, and were set 175 feet apart. Three lines were strung on them, which were known as the top bow wire, the arrow wire and the bottom bow wire. The three in the order named were strung above ground at the height of 31 feet 6 inches, 29 feet 3 inches, and 27 feet 3 inches. These wires crossed diagonally above the north end of said bridge. The arrow wire was nearly directly above the north upright of the east truss and 6 feet 2 inches above the truss. There was no water in the bed of the stream below this upright, only dry ground. The distance at this point from the arrow wire to the floor of the bridge was 22 feet 2 inches, and to the ground below the bridge was 32 feet.

The deceased was killed by an electric discharge from the arrow wire when he was at the top of the east truss at the place of the said north upright. He, with Loyd Hubler, aged 22 years, and Blanch Bell and Violet Coldwell, two young ladies about 17 years of age, started from Platteville in a single-seated automobile to take a ride on the Lancaster road. When they got upon this bridge Clifford asked them to stop and look at the fish. They stopped the car upon the bridge, and he got out, the others remaining in the auto. He started to climb up said upright by the zigzag cross-irons. The other three asked him to desist as he might fall into the water. He replied that there was no danger; for when a boy he had climbed the bridge many times. When he got to the top of the truss he leaned over it with...