A Major Accident
Friday 27th April 1923 began as an ordinary working day. That afternoon, Drive power-broker and realtor Charles Smith was driving his touring car south on Commercial. He had in the car with him a Mr Wilbrand who was looking for a property, and a Mr. Robinson who seems to have been just along for the ride.
Smith was in the process of turning east on 2nd Avenue when he realized that a large industrial truck was bearing down on them at speed, and that a collision could not be avoided. Smith yanked the car out of the way, but mounted the sidewalk and ran into a number of women talking at the corner. Mrs. Boulton, wife of the storekeeper at Commercial & 1st, was mortally injured and died in the ambulance on the way to hospital.
The truck that Smith was trying to avoid — carrying a load of cider barrels for Van Brothers — locked up its wheels as it skidded to avoid the car, grazed the sidewalk causing the barrels to fly though the air. One cider barrel struck Mrs Thomas Fea outside Thomas Cahill’s Grandview Grocery Store, throwing her against a telegraph pole, damaging her back and legs. Another of the barrels hit Smith’s car, leaving a big dent.
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