NEWS: Brakeman Frank MARTZ Fatally Injured, 1932, of interest in Somerset 
County, PA and Cumberland, MD 

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Meyersdale Library.
Transcribed and proofread by: Richard Boyer.

Copyright.  All rights reserved.
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FRANK MARTZ

Grim Tragedy - Stops Movement of Coal Cars - Brakeman Frank Martz Fatally 
Injured.

  NIVERTON, June 7 - The coal cars back of the Niverton Coal Company's tipple 
stand just as they did last Wednesday.  No locomotive has steamed to or from 
Niverton since that fatal day.  The last appearance of the iron horse was marred 
with grim tragedy.  Not within the memory of the Jaybird has this peaceful 
hamlet been so shocked by cruel fate.  Nivertonians are sympathetic and easily 
moved to pity.  The tragic fate of Brakeman Frank Martz of Cumberland upon his 
last visit to this village, in the discharge of his vocational duty, appalled 
them and evoked their deepest sympathy for his bereaved family.
  The depression cheated Frank Martz out of his job as conductor. Then, with 60 
years of life piled up back of him, the ex-conductor accepted a job as brakeman.  
As the train came into Niverton the last time, Martz was high on the crest of a 
coal car, manning the brakes.  There was a terrific crash.  The brakes shrieked; 
the rails rang.  Martz lost his balance and toppled from his perch.  After 
several cars loaded with coal had passed over his body, grinding off one leg 
above the ankle, the other near the knee, one arm above the wrist, he was found 
fully conscious.  They rushed him, on the engine, to the West Salisbury station, 
from which place Dr. B. H. Hoke, Jr., and Reich's ambulance took him to a 
Cumberland hospital.  He died within a half hour after arrival there.
  His wife and several children survive.

Meyersdale Republican, June 9, 1932