100 years ago in Eastern Washington: A quarry accident in Elk may have blinded two workers

Rock blasting was a perilous job, as two Spokane men found out while working in a quarry near Elk.

Edward Carson and Frank Bilford placed a charge of black powder in a hole drilled into a stone. Yet it was close to quitting time, so they decided to leave it until the next day.

When they arrived the next morning, they tried to set it off, but it would not ignite. So they decided to place a second charge.

While inserting the second charge into the hole, the first charge suddenly exploded, “throwing both men several yards and filling their faces with small bits of rock and dirt.”

By the time help reached them, “the were practically unable to say a word.”

A local doctor loaded them in his own car and drove them at full speed to Deaconess Hospital.

Their faces were badly lacerated, and doctors feared that the eyesight of both men had been permanently destroyed.

From the mermaid beat: The Spokane Daily Chronicle announced that every contestant in its “mermaid contest” (bathing beauty contest) would be featured in a movie film.

Pathe Weekly, a newsreel company, “will film the girls during the afternoon and will send the film over the country as part of its news and story service.”

“We are anxious to get some good scenes of the surf-board riding, the swimmers and divers in action, and of the mermaids during the judging,” the Pathe cinematographer said.

The question of how anybody could go “surf-board riding” on Liberty Lake was left unaddressed.