William
Osborne Minerd
(1866-1906)
William
Osborne Minerd was born on Nov. 15, 1866 at Bridgeport, near Mt. Pleasant,
Westmoreland County, PA, the son of Eli and Mary Ann (Baer)
Minerd. Sadly, he is one of many of our cousins to have been killed in railroad or trolley
accidents over the years.
William was a railroad laborer and lived in Connellsville, Fayette County, PA. He never married.
On Jan. 3, 1906, the Connellsville Daily Courier carried this tragic story about his grisly death:
BRAKEMAN
IS KILLED.
William
O. Minerd Met With Fatal Accident
in
the Local Yards at an Early Hour This Morning.
William Osborne Minerd of Bridgeport, but for the past seventeen years a Baltimore & Ohio flagman, was killed in the [Connellsville] yards at an early hour this morning. Chas. Rhomes, a yard employe came across lying along the tracks this morning. He was then in a dying condition and all that he could say to Rhomes was that he slipped. He was too weak to give an account of the accident. The hospital ambulance was hastily summoned, and he was removed to the hospital, but his injuries were fatal and he died shortly after arriving there. He was terribly cut and bruised. The unfortunate man is a son of Eli Minerd of Bridgeport. He was born in that town 37 years ago and began railroading at an early age, having worked on all the different branches of the road....
The B&O's busy yards at Connellsville,
with the
Youghiogheny River at right
Further investigation, said the Greensburg Daily Tribune, showed William slipped on a tie while making a coupling, "and fell under the train, the wheels of four cars passing over him at the hip."
He is buried beside his parents at the Alverton Cemetery near Mt. Pleasant.
Copyright © 2000, 2004, 2006 Mark A. Miner