Bio: Johnson, Dorothy Horn
Contact:  Eva Schiszik

----Source: Submitted by: Dorothy Horn Johnson For "The Curtiss, Wisconsin Centennial" 1882-1982; pg. 17.
 

ONE MEMORY... Dorothy seized the opportunity, not often afforded, to hang around to see No. 6 come in. One of the highlights of the day in the small country town was going to the station to watch the passenger trains come in, unload a passenger or two, take on one or two, throw off the mailbags, express, or other baggage and then with the conductor's final "All Aboard", watch it chug on its way to the next town. This morning, hearing the warning whistle and someone say, "Here she comes", she also noticed with considerable consternation as did all who were watching for the incoming train, that a woman driving a cart loaded with milk cans pulled by one horse, was whipping up her horse presumably hoping to beat the train across the track. Was she unaware that the train was bearing down on her? Who will ever know? All were suddenly frozen with horror to see her mount the track just in time to be struck full on, and all Dorothy remembered of that moment was the sight of horse, wagon, woman and cans flying up in the air as the train pulled into the station where it stopped. Everyone rushed to the crossing to witness the horrible sight as the horse and woman lay mangled amid the broken cans and shattered boards of the cart. It was a gruesome shambles, which associated an impressionable child's mind with the stench of the sour whey spilled from the milk cans, took away appetites for days. (it was the custom those days for the farmer who brought milk to the cheese factory to fill his emptied cans with whey, a by-product of the cheese making process, which combined with shorts or middling made excellent pig feed). The foregoing episode provided a subject for conversation over the counter for days.