Industrial Lumber Co. v. Bivens

105 S.W. 831, 47 Tex. Civ. App. 396, 1907 Tex. App. LEXIS 514
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedNovember 6, 1907
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 105 S.W. 831 (Industrial Lumber Co. v. Bivens) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Industrial Lumber Co. v. Bivens, 105 S.W. 831, 47 Tex. Civ. App. 396, 1907 Tex. App. LEXIS 514 (Tex. Ct. App. 1907).

Opinion

NEILL, Associate Justice.

—This suit was brought by Dennis Bivens against the Industrial Lumber Company to recover damages for personal injuries sustained by him through the alleged negligence of the defendant, while in its employ as operator of a trip machine in its sawmill at Vinton, La. The defendant pleaded not guilty, contributory negligence, assumed risk and negligence of a fellow servant. The trial resulted in a verdict and judgment in favor of the plaintiff for $6,000.

His injuries were inflicted on March 31, 1904. At the time they were sustained he was a minor, and was also a minor when the case was tried, but his disabilities had been removed in accordance with the laws of the State of Louisiana, where he resided before the suit was instituted.

To comprehend the nature of the case it is necessary to describe the machinery and appliances of the sawmill and the manner in which they were operated at the place and time the plaintiff was injured. There is a carriage track upon which the carriage runs that conveys the logs to the circular saw. In front of the saw, in the direction the logs are carried, is a table called the “live roller table,” which is about four feet wide and about seventy-two feet long. Extending across this table are a number of rollers about an inch in diameter, about half of the circumference extending above the top of the table, the other half being below the surface. They are about four feet apart, and when in operation all revolve (if in proper working order) with equal motion in the same direction that the circular saw does. One of these rollers, however, which was near the far end of the table, and beyond the space between the edger table and edger saws, and where plaintiff was standing, which are hereinafter described, was out of fix so that it did not revolve, and was in such condition as to be called “dead” by the witnesses to the accident, and had been in such defective condition for several days prior thereto.

Facing from the circular saw, to the left of, and about five feet from and parallel with the roller table, is another, called the “edger table,” which is about four feet wide and twelve feet long, the end nearest the circular saw being about forty-four feet from it. About twelve inches beyond this table, and parallel with the end of it, are installed upon the same plane what are called “edger saws,” four in number. There are two endless chains, eight or nine feet apart, parallel with each other, extending from the live roller to the edger table, the office of which will be explained in describing the purpose and operation of the machinery and appliances of the sawmill. These chains, when made to perform their office, are operated by means of a lever, moved by the pressure of the foot of one called the “tripman,” who stands about fifty-six feet from the end of the live roller table nearest the circular saw, and between such table and a twelve-inch space separating the *399 edger table from the edger saws. He stands nearer the live roller table and faces the end nearest the saw track. There ivas no partition or stanchion in or opposite the space between the edger tabje and the edger saws to protect one opposite said space from the saws, which were exposed, or prevent him from being thrown against them in the way plaintiff was, as will be hereinafter explained.

In running the sawmill the logs were placed upon-the carriage and carried thereon to and through the circular saw, then carried back and run through the saw again, this process being repeated until the sawing of the log was finished at such saw. The slabs and lumber into which the log was thus sawed were then placed upon the live roller table, and such pieces as were not fit for use were carried over the - table by the operation of its rollers to the far end, and thrown off into the “refuse pit,” and such pieces as were to have the edges trimmed " ivere likev'ise carried over the live rollers in the same manner opposite the edger table until they were upon the endless chains hereinbefore described, when the tripman, by pressing the lever, caused them to be. lifted from such table and carried over the chains to the edger table, from which they were run through the edger saws by the edger-saw man and their edges trimmed off.

At the time plaintiff was injured he was a tripman, operating the trip lever, and had only been in such employment three days up to that time. On this occasion a log thirty feet long was being run through the circular saw in the manner before described. Three slabs had been saAA'ed from different sides of it and carried off by means of the live rollers and throivn into the refuse pit. A slab was then sawed off the fourth side of the log and placed upon the live roller table to be carried - off in the same manner as the other three were. The slab, on account of the log being crooked, the curvature being on the side 'from which - it was taken, was much thicker at each end than it was in the middle, the thickness decreasing from either end towards the middle of the - slab. On account of the unevenness of the slab it did not touch and receive the force of all the rollers, and when its furthest end reached the “dead” roller it slowly passed over it and its end caught against the roller just beyond. In the meantime another slab had been sawed off which, together with a piece of timber which was 12 inches by twelve inches in thickness, made by the remainder of the log, was placed upon the liA'e rollers to be conveyed thereover. This slab and piece of timber were conveyed over the rollers more rapidly, for the reason above stated, than the slab preceding it, which we have just described, and therefore pushed against the near end of the slab Avith such force as to cause it to break in the middle, and the plaintiff, who was standing at or near the place where the trip leA'er was operated, in the discharge of the duty of his employment, Avas struck on his side by the broken end of the piece of the slab, against the end of which such - timbers were pushed, and knocked thereby over the near corner of the edger table onto a plank, the edges of which were being trimmed, and was either carried thereon or throAvn against the edger saws, which were in operation, and thereby sustained serious, painful and permanent physical injuries.

The evidence, in relation to the injuries sustKined by the plaintiff *400 in the manner above stated, was sufficient to warrant the jury in finding that the defendant was negligent in one or more of the following grounds, averred by plaintiff:

(1) In putting plaintiff to work in a dangerous place without instructing or warning him of the danger incident to his employment, he being at the time, on account of his age and inexperience, ignorant of such danger.
(2) In allowing one of the rollers in the live roller table to become out of repair and “dead,” so it would not perform its office.
(3) In' failing to erect a wall or stanchion between the position occupied by plaintiff while at work and the edger saws against which he was thrown and injured.

The evidence is also reasonably sufficient to warrant the jury in finding that one or more of such acts of negligence was the approximate cause of plaintiff’s injuries, and that such injuries were not caused by the negligence of any of his fellow servants, or by his own contributory negligence, or from any risk assumed by him as incident to his employment.

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Bluebook (online)
105 S.W. 831, 47 Tex. Civ. App. 396, 1907 Tex. App. LEXIS 514, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/industrial-lumber-co-v-bivens-texapp-1907.