OBIT: Lena BARONI, 1915, Listie, Somerset County, PA

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Meyersdale Library.
Transcribed and proofread by: Keith Petenbrink.

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Baroni, Lena

BOYS' PRANK KILLS GIRL, Their Tampering With a Telephone Wire Causes Her 
Electrocution When Her Foot Becomes Entangled. Lena Baroni, a pretty 16-year-old 
Austrian girl, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Angelo Baroni of Listie was electrocuted 
between 1 and 2 o'clock Sunday afternoon near her home about a mile and a half 
from Listie. She was climbing a rail fence when her foot became entangled with a 
section of loose telephone wire one end of which was hanging across a high 
tension transmission line of the Penn Electric company carrying 22,000 volts. A 
9 year old sister, Annie, had her hand burned when she also came in contact with 
the wire. The wire was a section that had been cut from a private telephone line 
of the Penn Company, carried on the same poles as the tension wires, when the 
former broke down several days ago. The section of wire had been cut out and 
coiled about the fence near the Baroni home. As early as last Thursday, it is 
declared, someone tied a stone to an end of the wire, tossing it over the high 
tension lines, the stone hanging about three feet below them. The other end 
remained coiled about the fence. The victim and her sister were returning from 
the woods, where they had been gathering Chestnuts. Annie was rendered 
unconscious as her hand came into contact with the wire. She recovered in a few 
minutes and valiantly endeavored to pull her sister from the entanglement. By a 
miracle the little girl escaped further injury. Dr. Fred B. Shaffer of Somerset 
was summoned but the little girl was dead before he arrived. Her parents, three 
brothers and two sisters survive. The family came here from Austria when Lena 
was two years of age. Investigation revealed evidence of a deliberate criminal 
misdemeanor. Apparently the girl was the victim of boys' pranks. The 
investigation revealed a piece of fence wire swung across one of three high 
powered current lines of the Penn Electric Service Company of Johnstown. A stone 
weighing seven or eight pounds had been tied to one end and thrown across the 
lowest of the three wires. The weight of the stone caused the fence wire to wrap 
around the electric wire a couple of times holding it securely. The other end of 
the fence wire was lying across a rail fence. A reward of $300 has been offered 
by the Penn Company for the arrest of the ones guilty. The body of the 
unfortunate girl was brought to Meyersdale for interment, mass being said by 
Father Brady in the Catholic Church.

Meyersdale Commercial, Nov. 11, 1915