The headline
in the Neillsville, Wisconsin newspaper nearly a century ago read—CLARK COURT
HOUSE FURNACE EXPLODES. My grandfather, who then worked as a janitor at the court house had the surprise of a
lifetime. The assistant clerk at the
court house was “cleaning house” in the office and tossed a two ounce bottle of
nitroglycerin, which was 24 years old, into the waste basket. She thought it was a harmless liquid. That was
an unfortunate and nearly deadly mistake.
My
grandfather OIuf took the basket to the basement and threw the contents into
the furnace. A short time later and a
few steps away he heard a blast that “sounded like an old-fashioned Fourth
of July celebration.” The furnace doors flew
open and all the ashes in the vicinity made their way into the room. As the paper described it, “Oluf turned three
double handsprings and when he stopped to see where he was, discovered himself
on the East Side of the standpipe.”
Two men in
another room were making a deal for a large supply of maple syrup when the
explosion occurred. They raced to
retrieve their hats and coats and were several blocks away before “the last
echo of the explosion had subsided.”
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| My grandfather Oluf on the right |
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| My grandpa (on left) with my dad in later years--he lived to tell the tale! |
The
newspaper added, “Had the amount of nitroglycerin been of its original power
the blast undoubtedly would have removed all traces of the court house.” I wish that my grandfather was still around
to tell about it. What a tale that would
have been!
That reminds me of when I was in the army. I was often commandeered to empty all the waste baskets into a huge old oil drum and burn it. To make things more interesting, I always "obtained" several unused spray paint cans that I added to the drum before burning the stuff from the waste baskets. Every time a can exploded, it resulted in a nice mushroom cloud above the barrel. Much more interesting than just a plain fire in a barrel.
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