Dynamite!
My only knowledge of dynamite comes from watching Wyle E. Coyote try to obliterate the Road Runner. In looking at countless old newspapers it is shocking how often horrible accidents with dynamite occurred.
Nitroglycerine was first made in 1846 by an Italian chemist by treating glycerol with a mixture of nitric and sulphuric acid. The mixture was highly volatile, especially if impure nitroglycerin was used. It was very difficult to predict under which conditions nitroglycerine would explode.
Dynamite was invented by Alfred Nobel, he solved the problem of stabilizing nitroglycerine and then inventing the blasting cap, which allowed for the safe detonation of the substance. He received a patent for it in 1867.
Nobel found that by mixing the liquid nitroglycerine with diatomaceous earth, a type of silica, the resulting mixture could be kneaded and shaped into rods suitable for insertion into drilling holes.
The blasting cap was a small charge of mercury fulminate in a metal container which would then be placed into the dynamite. The cap then used the safety fuse, which was pressed or crimped on, at various lengths that blasters used to give it timing.
The sticks of dynamite could be safely transported and would only explode when triggered with a blasting cap. Dynamite would change the world, made possible large scale excavations in rocky conditions possible. The construction of skyscrapers, dams, tunnels, railway lines and roads were made easier. Over 60 million pounds of dynamite were used during the construction of the Panama Canal. In 1913 the Pittsburg Daily Headlight ran a column entitled, "The Appaling Loss of Life Through the Use of Dynamite - Caused by Premature Explosions and Inability On the Part of the Average Canal Laborer To Understand the Real Danger of Handling It."
It was also a great boon to farmers, many of whom kept a few sticks handy for the removal of rocks and stumps. DuPont even published a booklet entitled, "Farming with Dynamite." One ad pointed out, "Much of the work done with a spade or an axe, a pick or a bar, can be done more quickly, cheaply and thoroughly with dynamite.
As with the Panama Canal workers, many average farmers failed to understand the danger of handling it. Oddly it seems many accidents occurred when folks were attempting to "thaw out" or "dry" their dynamite. I can't figure out why the dynamite might need thawing or drying.
January 22, 1901: Waterloo, IA - Joseph Long is another victim to the dangerous habit which many have who use dynamite for blasting purposes and think they can thaw it without explosion. He was holding two sticks of the stuff with his hands in the oven of a cook stove when they let go, destroying both of his arms, lacerating his face and tearing a great hole in his side.
Apr. 25, 1903: Richville MI - Dynamite was put under Fred List's stove to dry, it caught fire and Mrs. List, age 42, was wrapped in flames. Her husband and 10 children survive.
April 10, 1905: Tacoma, WA - Thomas Carlson, a logger was instantly killed yesterday (…) He had been thawing dynamite over an open fire(…). Carlson's body was literally torn to pieces.
Feb. 23, 1909: Port Arthur, Ont. - (…) details have reached here of a dynamite accident resulting in the death of seven railroad laborers. The accident was the old story of premature discharge while tamping in a rock cut.
March 5, 1909: Marshalltown, IA -Forty-One in Nameless Grave. Winnipeg, Manitoba; Persons returning from the shores of Good Lake (…) came across a burying ground with forty-one nameless graves. All the victims of dynamite accidents in the construction of the Grand Trunk Pacific. They were foreigners and known only by numbers, and nothing was found on their clothes by which identification could be made.
Jan. 1, 1914: Downington, PA - Two men "Blown To Atoms Thawing Dynamite."
Aug. 21, 1915: Columbus, IN - Three cows (...) either committed suicide or else met accidental deaths as the result of eating dynamite.
As late as 2018, it was reported in Connecticut, that a woman suffered serious injuries to her face and lost several fingers. Her home lost power in a storm and she remembered that the former owner of the house had left some candles in the basement. What she lit was a quarter-stick of dynamite.
Alfred Nobel had hoped that dynamite would be used to the benefit of mankind. He spoke of producing a substance of "such frightful efficacy for wholesale destruction that it would make wars impossible." Obviously this was not the case.
In mid-April of 1888 Alfred Nobel found his obituary prominently featured in his morning newspaper. He was described as a merchant of death, becoming rich by finding a way to kill more people faster than ever before. It is said he immediately changed his will and set up what we now call the Nobel Prize. As it happens Alfred's older brother Ludvig had died while vacationing in Cannes and a reporter got the brothers mixed up and thought it was Alfred who had died.
In doing further research I find this story is not true and was made up by an unscrupilous biographer in 1959. No one has been able to find the newspaper calling him a "merchant of death." His death was indeed mistakenly reported but the statement printed was much milder. He lay the foundation for the Nobel Prize, in 1895, when he wrote his last will, seven years after his death was erroneously announced. The first awards were given in 1901.
In my research I have come many dynamite accidents but two that are sort of close to home. One is the death, on July 26, 1907, of Maynard Needham Hemingway, and his family, in Otter Lake, Michigan. He is an ancestor of Eric Anderson and therefore my Anderson grandchildren. Maynard Hemingway, the victim of this accident, is the 8th cousin of the author, Ernest Hemingway, meaning they shared a 7th great-grandparent. Eric is Maynard's first cousin, 5x removed meaning they shared a 5th great-grandparent and he is Ernest Hemingway's 8th cousin 5x removed.*** The pool of people here is in the many thousands but it's fun to figure out, see footnote.
Maynard Hemingway was a clerk in his brother's hardware store in Otter Lake, Michigan. He and his wife Carrie, each 25 years old and their 15-month-old daughter Eleanor were killed when lightning struck a cache of dynamite at the back of the hardware store. The resultant explosion tore the brick structure to pieces and the three were buried in the ruins. As the building collapsed, fire broke out. The fire was so fierce that it took the volunteer fire department until midnight to get the fire under control, a heavy rainstorm at 11 pm aiding in the effort.
Mrs. Hemingway was recovered first, her body burned beyond recognition, she was found under the store safe, which had to be removed with the assistance of a team of horses. The body of Mr. Hemingway was found further back in the store, his head having been blown partly off by the explosion of the dynamite.
Some accounts, more gruesome that others, report that the top of Maynard's head was blown off and that not all of his body parts were found and further reported that all bodies were burned beyond recognition. Little Eleanor was found further back in the store, her body was wrapped in a blanket and lain beside her parents. Mr. Hemingway was buried in one coffin, Carrie and Eleanor were buried together in another. They had been married just a little over two years.
Accounts differ as to why Carrie was in the store; some report she had gone to walk her husband home for dinner as was her usual practice while others say she went to the store because she was frightened by the storm. What is not in dispute is the complete destruction of the building and great damage to surrounding buildings. Windows were shattered in several buildings nearby. The millinery store across the street suffered a great loss due to the goods being damaged by the storm. The owner of the millinery store lived above the store. She reported that her son, who was sick in bed, was thrown from his bed as a result of the explosion.
The following March a case came before the circuit court regarding two life insurance policies that Maynard Hemingway had purchased, each for a thousand dollars. The court was attempting to determine who died first and was therefore due the life insurance pay out. The argument was as follows; when the body of Mr. Hemingway was found the top of his head was completely taken off which would have caused instant death. Mrs. Hemingway was found with her hands covering her face as if to avert the falling debris and pinned to the ground by part of a falling wall (nothing here about being underneath a safe that took a team of horses to remove). Thus, they argued, she might not have been killed instantly.
The second story involves a Mr. Scott, owner of the Scott mine, he is never given a first name in the news, but W. A. Scott, fourth and final husband of Leona Weldon in a previous story is not the same guy. That Mr. Scott did not arrive in Deming for another seven years. This is just a sad story I found along the way.
The accident referred to in the newspaper occurred on Monday, October 26, 1908, at the Scott mine in the Florida Mountains, a small mountain range about 15 miles southeast of Deming, New Mexico. New Mexico mined a lot of silver and gold early in the century, but I haven't been able to find any further information about that particular mine. Deming was an important railway and mining town, most of the ores from the surrounding area were shipped directly to smelters from Deming. The town was at the junction of the Santa Fe and Southern Pacific railways. It is 100 miles almost straight east of Tucson, Arizona and 80 miles northeast of El Paso/ Ciudad Juárez.
The north/south streets in town are named after trees: Maple, Pine, Hemlock etc. The east/west avenues are named after minerals, Copper, Zinc, Gold, etc. The Tidmore family ran a restaurant on and lived on Silver Avenue. Curiously an 1898 map shows the restaurant at the corner of Railroad Avenue (the only street that doesn't follow the aforementioned rule) and Silver. In the one block of Silver Avenue between Railroad and Pine are listed five establishments labeled, " Chinese Laundry"!
There were three people in the camp blacksmith shop, Mr. Scott, Clarence, Tidmore, and little Dick Tidmore. Clarence, age 24 and Dick, age 15: sons of Martin and Mary Tidmore. Mr. Scott was sharpening tools at the forge and Clarence was blowing the bellows. The accident was caused by the explosion of 90 dynamite blasting caps that had been left in an uncovered box on top of the forge. A spark is supposed to have fallen in the box, setting off the caps. It is reported that Mr. Scott had bent over for some reason and Clarence, 18 inches away, received the full force of the explosion. his body from the waist up was riddled with pieces of the caps. The paper reports "it is almost certain that both eyes are out." The paper further reports that Little Dick was knocked down and stupefied considerably.
What follows is like a horrible Keystone Cops episode. "The news of the terrible accident was brought to town as quick as possible." The paper does not elaborate on how the news was brought, nor just how quickly. The local doctor, two brothers of the Tidmore's , as well as others left at once in an automobile for the scene. 'After administering some care, the three were placed in automobiles and driven to town. The party of automobiles encountered a series of accidents on the way to town. They lost the road several times., broke down , and all such.´ The party did not reach the hospital, 15 miles from the mine, until after 1 AM the following day a full 16 1/2 hours after the accident.
Doctors stated that Clarence, if he did not contract lockjaw, would probably recover although he might be badly disfigured. The reality is nowhere near as rosy. An update in the newspaper three weeks after the accident says that Clarence has been taken to El Paso, "in the hopes the young man's site may be saved."
The 1910 census, enumerated on April 25, 1910, shows that the family still runs a restaurant and has a home on Silver Avenue. Clarence, the oldest child in the home, is 27 years old and his occupation is listed as none, the column marked blind is checked.
Mary Tidmore, the mother of Clarence, died on June 4, 1910, her obituary said she had been ill for four months. She was 51 years old. Her husband and all seven children are listed as surviving her. She was a woman of fine attainments, according to the newspaper. An obituary in another newspaper says, in a single sentence, "Since coming to Deming the family seems to have been particularly unfortunate, meeting with financial reverses, and sickness, something over a year ago, the oldest son M. C. Junior was blinded for life by an explosion of dynamite caps where he was working in Florida's." It is my belief that after the death of Mary, the family was unable to care for Clarence, and he was institutionalized, His sister, Ruth, 14, was the youngest and only girl at home, she was sent to live with her sister, Annie in Seattle.
In September 1918, a World War I registration card is filled out on behalf of Clarence Tidmore by the superintendent of the New Mexico Insane Asylum. His permanent address is given as the Miners Hospital in Colfax County, New Mexico. His next of kin is a brother in California. It is noted he is of medium build and height with light brown hair and blue eyes and that he is blind in both eyes and insane. In the 1920, 1930 and 1940 censuses he is enumerated as an inmate in the New Mexico Insane Asylum in Las Vegas, New Mexico. Clarence died in 1948 and his presumed to be buried in the hospital cemetery. The last burial was in 1987 and the cemetery was then abandoned and The Bureau of Land Management took control. It is said that cattle were allowed to roam the cemetery area and that at one time a mechanical weed hog ripped the headstones into fragments. Some data has been released by the New Mexico State hospital, but the vast amount has not been. The Mental Health Association of New Mexico is attempting to preserve the area and document the dead. The association has reclaimed the cemetery, cleaned it up and fenced it in. They have only found nine visible markers. So far institutional records for Mark Clarence Tidmore have not been found.
Dick Tidmore, who, according to the article, was stupefied considerably, seems to have had a rough life following the accident. He worked at the family restaurant or at the family mine and for a short while he worked in his brother's clothing store . In 1915 he participated in a wrestling event in which M. Leo, who claims to be wrestling champion of the US Navy, says he can throw three men out of the ring within an hour. Dick was the second man thrown out, having lasted 10 minutes. The following year he became a part owner in a shooting gallery. The following week, he was arrested for discharging a pistol in front of the store, he was fined $10 and released. Four months later, he was again arrested on the much more serious charge of furnishing whiskey to prisoners in the jail. He was fined $50 and the charge changed to vagrancy. In 1917 he and his brother joined the fourth Texas Infantry at El Paso and were sent to France where their unit was involved in the Meuse-Argonne offensive. Dick served as a cook and his brother in the infantry. Dick mustered out in 1919 at Fort Bliss, Texas.
In 1923 he married in El Paso and had two sons. One son Robert, died at the age of 5 1/2 of diphtheria. In the 1930 and 1940 census, he has no occupation listed, in the 1950s census he is listed as unable to work. He died in 1955 in Prescott, Arizona, where he is buried in the National Cemetery .
***You may think, "wow, it's special to be related to Ernest Hemingway" but my guess is there are many million more out there. Eric is 8 generations away and if each person in each generation had an average of 7 children the number of descendants would be about 5,764,801, roughly the population of Minnesota.And, you might think each person having 7 children, on average, is a lot, but our Lt. Kellogg had 16 children that lived to adulthood and of the ones I could find data for, they had an average of 9 children each. They weren't worrying about population control back then, rather they were thinking to populate their farms with workers! And they weren't aware of any way to limit the number of children except, I suppose, by abstinence. The rhythm method wasn't even understood until about the 1930's.
