Winkelman & Brown Drug Co. of Baltimore City v. Colladay

• Decision Date: 29 June 1898
• Parties: WINKELMAN & BROWN DRUG CO. OF BALTIMORE CITY v. COLLADAY.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

40 A. 1078
88 Md. 78

WINKELMAN & BROWN DRUG CO. OF BALTIMORE CITY
v.
COLLADAY.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

June 29, 1898.

Appeal from Baltimore city court Action by Charles R. Colladay, Jr., against the Winkelman & Brown Drug Company of Baltimore City. Judgment for plaintiff. Defendant appeals. Affirmed.

Argued before McSHERRY, C. J., and BRYAN, BRISCOE, PAGE, ROBERTS, and BOYD, JJ.

Samuel J. Harman, for appellant.

Gans & Haman and Vernon Cook, for appellee.

BRISCOE, J. The appellant is a corporation conducting a wholesale drug business at No. 31 Sharp street, Baltimore. The appellee, who was plaintiff below, was employed by the company, and was seriously injured by the falling of a dumb-waiter while engaged in work on the second floor of the company's warehouse. It is alleged by the declaration that the plaintiff was employed by the defendant, and had charge of the defendant's patent-medicine department, on the second floor of its warehouse; that it was necessary for the plaintiff to receive orders which were given to him by calling in a loud voice from the first floor through the shaft of a dumb-waiter which was operated in the warehouse, and that on or about the 25th day of November, 1894, the plaintiff, being in the discharge of his duties, and inclining his head towards the shaft of the dumb-waiter, as he was compelled to do in order to discharge his duties, and in order to hear the orders given in the manner aforesaid, was violently struck upon the head by the falling of the dumb-waiter, which fall was caused by the negligence of the defendant in not providing a proper dumb-waiter, and by its negligence in not properly maintaining the same and the rope connected therewith. At the conclusion of the testimony of the plaintiff, the court was asked by the defendant to take the case from the jury, and, its prayers to this effect having been refused, the case was submitted upon the plaintiff's evidence. The plaintiff offered two prayers, and the defendant eight aditional prayers. The plaintiff's prayers were granted; and the defendant's third, fifth, sixth, and seventh were granted, but its fourth, eighth, ninth, and tenth were rejected. The case was tried before a jury, and, the judgment being for the plaintiff, the company has appealed.

The questions are solely upon exceptions to the rulings of the court upon the prayers, and they come to this: First, was the defendant guilty of negligence? and, second, was the plaintiff guilty of such...