OBIT: Thomas MAGUIRE, 1878, Altoona, Blair County, PA

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HORRIBLE ACCIDENT 

  Tuesday afternoon of last week a man named Thomas Maguire, a resident 
of Altoona, met with a horrible and instant death in the "yard" of the 
Pennsylvania Railroad in that city.  He was standing on a track upon 
which six cars were being dropped down, and failing to notice their 
approach in time he was struck and thrown with his neck resting on one 
of the rails.  The wheels of five of the cars passed over him, 
completely severing the head from the trunk. Both legs and one of his 
arms were also fractured.  It was a most sickening spectacle for the 
few eye witnesses of the awful tragedy, and they were all paralyzed 
with horror.  The remains were gathered up and conveyed to the late 
residence of deceased, on Sixteenth avenue, and the scene that ensued 
when the mutilated body was brought home to his wife and children can 
be imagined, but not described.  Deceased was aged about 50 years, and 
had been in the employ of the company for a long time as a track hand.  
His terrible death is only another instance of the fact that even those 
who are best acquainted with the tracks in the Altoona yard are 
generally the ones who meet with fatal accidents at that point.  They 
become altogether too careless, and consequently take risks which 
others, less familiar with the manner of shifting trains, would not.

Democratic Standard, Hollidaysburg, Pa., Wednesday, June 19, 1878