Coal Truck Flips - Is It News?

George Lilley photographed a lot of accidents. Car crashes into fence. Photo! Car crashes into rock cut. Photo! Cars crash into each other on a foggy night. Photo! Coal truck flips over in broad daylight? You guessed it, photo! Actually, three photos. What attracted me to this flash-filled photo (top) was the setting more than the accident. The cropped photo, shows mainly the truck. The one below shows more of the context of the incident:

The whole story made the Whig on August 11, 1948 - in a short, three-paragraph item. Turns out the James Richardson and Sons coal truck, driven by Edward F. Convery of North Macdonnel [sic] Street flipped over because a CN locomotive, on the spur to the Canada Steamship Lines elevator just to the south, appeared suddenly, while the coal truck was 70 or so feet to the east, heading west! The unfortunate driver's view was hampered by trees, and he suffered a sprained right hip and back as a result. (I wonder what shattered the passenger-side windshield?) Damage to the truck was $400. Unfortunately, Mr Convery was in another accident two years earlier, when his panel truck rear-ended another car on Palace Road. Interestingly, he retired as a dock supervisor at the Richardson dock, right across from the grain elevator, in April, 1988. He died six weeks later, after a four-month illness, at only 62 years of age.

These two 1951 aerial views, also taken by George Lilley and all kept in the Queen's University Archives, show the location of the incident - looking east, (above) and north from the lake (below). At the time, Front Road had not been relocated to its current causeway west of the crossing, and the sharp curve is now the remnant of King Street West.

More context! A surplus Canadian Military Pattern from the recent World War II has stopped, maybe to assist with the cleanup. Neighbourhood kids, perhaps swimming at the nearby sandy beach, peer curiously at the sight. Look at one peeking surreptitiously around the mailbox! The crossing is barely visible, but the crossbuck signs warning of it, and all that foliage around it show how one could be surprised by an approaching train, even one travelling at the low speed of less than 10 mph.

Another view of the aftermath. Now, the really interesting part of this story, at least to me...none of these photos appeared in the Whig the next day! Thank goodness the archives preserves the visual story, though we have to go there and dig to find it, even if the local daily's editor didn't!