OBIT: James STAKE, 1963, Mount Union, Huntingdon County, PA Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Sharon Miller Copyright 2010. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/pafiles.htm __________________________________________ Mt. Union Youth Takes Own Life A Mount Union boy died yesterday afternoon at J. C. Blair Hospital, Huntingdon, as a result of a self-inflicted bullet wound, according to Mount Union Borough police. James Stake, 17, North Drake Street, inflicted the wound Saturday, in spite of a friend's efforts to stop him, Police Chief Berlin Whitsel said today. Stake, a student at Captain Jack High School, reportedly had had trouble with a girl friend, of whom he was admittedly jealous, sometime Saturday evening, the chief disclosed. He took a 30-30 caliber rifle from his home, where he lived his mother, Mrs. Edgar Stake. Byran Donaldson, a teenage friend, tried to dissuade Stake when he announced going to do away with himself. Donaldson took the youth to the home of the First Presbyterian minister in Mt. Union, got out of the car on West Market st. to enlist the ministers' help. Stake jumped out of the car, Chief Whitsel said, and ran down the street about a block. Donaldson ran after him, pleading and talking. As soon as the Donaldson youth stopped talking, Whitsel said, Stake discharged the rifle. The bullet entered the lower part of his stomach and came out in the lower hip area. He was taken to the hospital in an ambulance shortly after 9 p.m. Saturday, and died at 3:40 p.m. yesterday. Chief Whitsel said investigation had revealed the boy had mentioned several times his intention to take his own life. He is survived by his mother and a 15- year-old sister. The father is deceased. Daily Herald, Tyrone, Pa., Monday, April 22, 1963