Obit: Gorsegner, Everett C. #2 (1931 - 1969)

Contact: Dolores (Mohr) Kenyon
E-mail: dolores@wiclarkcountyhistory.org 

Surnames: Gorsegner, Lulloff, Domini, Clouse, Stutte, Schultz, Oldham

----Source: Clark County Press (Neillsville, Clark Co., WI) 4/03/1969

Gorsegner, Everett C. (1931 - 30 March 1969)

Funeral services were held from Trinity Lutheran Church in Loyal Wednesday afternoon for Everett C. Gorsegner, 38, former Clark County District Attorney who Sunday became the county’s first victim of a snowmobile accident.

Gorsegner, the father of three children and a practicing attorney in Loyal, was injured fatally when he was thrown from his machine at a junction of the Butler fire lane and a Town of Butler road, northwest of Mead Dam. He was leading a group of friends on other snowmobiles along a trail which they had traveled the previous afternoon. In the group was his father, Clarence E. Gorsegner, also a former Clark County District Attorney and law partner of his son.

He died at 3:50 p.m. at memorial Hospital in Neillsville, about 20 minutes after his admission there. Death was reported due to internal injuries. An autopsy was ordered by Coroner Robert Lulloff to determine the exact cause of death. Gorsegner was brought to the hospital in a car by Robert Domini and Wayne Clouse, both of Loyal, who were in the party.

The coroner said he was told by members of the party that Gorsegner’s snowmobile, leading the others, apparently was thrown by a snow bank left by the snowplows which had operated on the town road. They were crossing the ditch line onto the south Butler fire lane, and the snow bank acted like a jumping ramp. He said that Gorsegner apparently was thrown with force against a hard object, which county officers’ surmise was either the handlebars or the steering post of his 45 horsepower machine. His body showed a large bruise in the abdominal area, indicating a forceful collision with some hard object.

The snowmobile of Terry Stutte, also of Loyal, and which Gorsegner had just passed before the mishap, catapulted into the air. Stutte also was thrown, knocked unconscious and suffered damage to four front teeth, a bruised chin and a leg injury.

Officers Dale Schultz and Walter Oldham, who went to the scene after they were notified of the fatality, said marks there indicated that Gorsegner may have been thrown and rolled about 140 feet.