INTO ETERNITY

Was the Lives of Three Young Girls Hurled

Josie Zoble, Katie Schaf and Mary Wheeler Run Down by Big Four Train at Prescott

Awful Accident on a Crossing

Ladies Were on Way to Frank Hulsman's in a Buggy

Sisters Witnessed the Tragedy that Turned the Community into the Deepest Gloom

The awfullest and the most heart rending accident that ever occurred in Shelby county happened in Prescott Monday afternoon. The lives of three young, pure and honest girls were swept into eternity in the twinkling of an eye. Three happy homes were turned into house of deepest mouring while yet the merry laugh of the daughter rang through the rooms. Relatives and neighbors shuddered over the awful catastrophe while friends stood with bowed heads and silent lips all powerless to give peace and quiet and comfort to those whose heart strings were torn and whose prayers were offered for comfort.
Josie Zoble, daughter of Mr. and Mrs George Zoble, who live immediately west of the Prescott district school; Katie Schaf, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Nicholas Schaf, who reside in Prescott and Mary Wheeler, daughter of Mr. and Mrs Johnny L. Wheeler, who live south east of this city, were the victims of a railroad crossing accident.
Miss Zoble was eighteen years old; Miss Schaf was nineteen on June 26th and Miss Wheeler was sisteen.
The story of their tragic death is not a long one. The congregation of St. Vincent church, of which the parents of the girls, as well as the girls themselves, are members, arranged some time age to hold a Diamond Jubilee Entertainment at the church on Thursday of this week, commencing at two o'clock in the afternoon and continuing until ten o'clock. Miss Zoble, Miss Schaf and Miss Wheeler had been selected to take part in the enterainment and they were on the way to the home of Mr. and Mrs Frank Hulsman for a rehersal when they were killed. After dinner a horse was hitched to an end-spring buggy for Mary Wheeler and taking her sister, Susie, who is a very bright child, she drove to the home of Josie Zoble, who with her two sisters, Mary and Helen, were in waiting. This drive is a short one being on the direct road from Mr. Wheeler's to Prescott. At the home of the Zobles Susie Wheeler got in a buggy with Mary and Helen Zoble and Josie Zoble got in the buggy with Mary Wheeler. It was just a short disctance around the first turn in the road to the home of Katie Schaf and thither they went for their friend and companion.
People who are at all famaliar with the lay of Prescott will remember that there is a road that passes along on the west side of the little village running direct north and south, the Big Four tracks crossing it from the south east to the north west, making a sharp angle. Back and in the point of this angle a few feet is a blacksmith shop. Joining this building on the south is an old shed like building. To the south east of the shop is a two story buggy shop, these building effectually cutting off the sight of an approaching train from the east. In the rear of the old shed like building is a narrow vacant lot on which corn is growing. Through this space it would be possible to see a train from the wagon road if parallel with it. Still south of this lot and still along the wagon road are the back parts of a number of Buildings that face the railroad tracks, these effectually cutting off all the view of any train approaching the crossing from the east. When the girls were opposite the vacant lot mentioned the train that killed them was several hundred years away and running at a rate of forty miles an hour, if not faster. On this wagon road, situated two or three hundred years from the crossing is the home of Mr. Schaf.
When Katie Schaf got in the buggy with Josie Zoble and Mary Wheeler the three younger girls were behind them. Susie Wheeler, in telling her short story to the Republican, said that she was trying to pass the other three girls but that her horse didn't travel right. It did not take, perhaps, more than a minute for the girls to drive from Mr. Schaf's home to the crossing. Little Susie Wheeler said she did not hear the train, that the first she knew the engine hit the buggy her sister was in at the rear wheels and then she didn't know what happened. The horse was trtting when the buggy was hit. The train was the "White City Flyer" that leaves Cincinnati at 12:20 and is due here at 2:33. It is one of the fastest train on the raod and was in charge of Engineer Omer Henry, of Indianapolis.
On the west side of the crossing is a cattle guard with vary strong end fences. Against this fence on the left side of the track looking in the direction the train was going, the buggy was huried. It was absolutely broken into kindling with the exception of the left front wheel which was not even scratched. It was picked up in little pieces and piled in a pile. The horse was trown to the right of the track. As it passed the cattle guard fence its face was mashed in on the top of the post, slivers of bones being driven into the hard wood. It was hurled a distance of not less than sixty feet and landed in the edge of a corn field, dead. From the time the engineer could see the buggy until he hit it was not a second. Susie Wheeler says the whistle sounded the instant of the crash.
The top of the buggy was entangled in the pilot of the engine and in this bit of wreckage was the form of Josie Zoble. The engineer reversed his engine and brought the train to a standstill within the eighth of a mile. The train men ran to the pilot and in a moment had Miss Zoble's body in the baggage car but she was then dead, her skull having been broken but not crushed. Blood was oozing from the eyes, ears, mouth and nose. Mary Wheeler and Katie Schaf were thrown full sixty feet to the left of the road bed, their bodies being carried almost parallel with the tracks, bot being found in the high grass not more than fifteen feet from the nearest rail. Miss Schaf's neck was broken. She was a most beatiful young lady and was a sister of Mrs. Harry Vanway and Mrs. Frank Ecksteine. With the exception of a very slight scratch just under the lower jaw not a mark was visible. She was beautiful in life and in death she seemed heavenly, her face being as pure and as clear as alabaster.
Miss Wheeler was picked up within a very few feet of where Miss Schaf lay. Life had not entirely fled from her body and tender hands bore her to the home of Anthony Wisker, Jr., which was close by, but within thirty minutes her pure soul had escaped from its prison and with that of her two companions had winged its flight into the great unknown. Not three minutes before had these three young and beautiful girls, in the first blush of womanhood, left the home of their companion and with her drove to a death that was quicker than a flash. As the train passed the barn yard of Mr. Whisker he and a traveling man were setting up a machine and they clearly saw the form of Miss Zoble clinging to the pilot of the engine.
In a short time after the tragedy the bodies were removed to the home of the bereaved parents. It is useless here to attempt to tell the anguish of these mothers and of these fathers, the brothers and the sisters. This little Zoble girls who witnessed the accident were prostrated and could tell nothing. Mrs. Wheeler was to overcome that her physican was sent for. At all the homes, the grief was the kind that comes with sudden and great bereavements. Better it is to shut this out from the world. Sorrow of this nature is sacred.
One of the very sad incidents of this accident was the manner in which the news reached Mrs. Wheeler of the death of her daughter. When it was first learned that Katie Schaf was killed it was not known that Mary Wheeler was in the buggy. Word was telephoned to Mrs. Wheeler that Katie Schaf was killed and she immediately drove to the home of Mrs. Schaf. As she entered the house she met Mrs. Schaf and spoke words of Sympathy and condolence to which Mrs. Schaf replied, "Why, Mrs. Wheeler, don't you know that your daughter, Mary was killed?" The shock was so terrible that the two mothers could say no more, in a short time Mrs. Wheeler was taken to her home and the lifeless form of her daughter was taken in a conveyance.
Aside from the three little girls who were in the buggy there was but one eye witness to the accident, that person being B. H. Leland, who was some distance east of the crossing. All that he saw was the buggy lifted into the air. He is sure the engineet whistled for the crossing at the regular place to signal.
There are no people who stand higher in the extimation of their friends and neighbors than these bereaved families. Hundreds of people went to the scene of the accident and many called at the homes.
The funeral of the three girls will be held at the St. Vincent church Wednesday morning at 9:30 o'clock, Rev. Father Bauer, of the church, being in charge. The start will be from the home of Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler at eight o'clock. The cortege will go to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Zoble and from there to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Schaf, traveling over the same road traversed by the girls, and from there to the church. Sixteen young girls dressed in white and wearing wreaths will act as the pall bearers. The interment will be at the St. Vincent graveyard.
The entertainment that was to have been given at St. Vincent church on Thursday has been postponed. Sadness prevails in every home in that neighborhood.

IN THE SHADOW OF THE TOMB

Funeral this Morning of the Three Victims of the Crossing Accident

The rain and the moist-ladened atmosphere, the sodden condition of the earth, the care of life did not prevent a great concourse of people gathering this morning to witness the funeral of Mary Wheeler, Josie Zoble and Katie Schaf, the three victims of the crossing accident Monday afternoon. It is estimated that not less then 600 rigs conveyed the people, indicating a crowd of near 2,000. The start to beautiful St. Vincent was made from the home of Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler. Out through the wood pasture, down the road to the home of Mr. Zoble wound the sad procession. At this second home, dark and gloomy with the presence of death, the corpse of Josie Zoble, with her parents, brother and sisters and friends joined the silent throng that now moved on to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Schaf where another sorrow-stricken concourse was in waiting. Here the hearse bearing the form of Katie Schaf took up the march to the tomb. On across the fateful crossing the column moved and a more somber scene was nover witnessed in that community. At the church Father Bauer, Father Kaelein, of this city and Father Fischer, of Greensburg, conducted the services according to the customs of the Church faith. At the close of the ceremony the caskets were opened that all might be given an opportunity to take a last look at the faces of the girls whom they had loved and whose taking away has occasioned such wide-spread grief.
The interment of Mary Wheeler was made first followed by that of Josie Zoble and then Katie Schaf. What a sad sight it was and in the providence of God may it nover be witnessed again. (The Shelby Republican, July 20, 1900)