Bio: Joyce, Wm. Sr. (Cows Killed by Lightning - 1966)

Contact: stan@wiclarkcountyhistory.org

Surnames: Joyce, Sternitzky

----Source: THORP COURIER (Thorp, Clark County, Wis.) 21 Jul 1966

Joyce, Wm. Sr. (Cows Killed by Lightning - 18 JUL 1966)

Lightning is blamed for the death of 19 cows and heifers during a severe electrical storm in this area early Monday morning.

William Joyce Sr., route 1, Greenwood (Clark Co., Wis.) discovered 12 Holstein heifers under a large tree in his pasture around noon Monday.

The animals were part of a heard belonging to his son, Wilbur, route, 1, Greenwood, and apparently had gathered around the tree for shelter from the storm, when lightning struck the tree, peeling the bark on one side.

Oscar Sternitzky, who live on a farm east of Lynn (Clark Co., Wis., said that seven cows were killed in the barn on his farm around 6 a.m., following a sharp flash of lightning.

Sternitzky said that three sharp bolts of lightning between 5:45 and 6:15 a.m. cut electrical power, and each time the lightning flashed, all 27 cows in the barn fell down.

The seven animals died shortly after the third bolt had struck, however he had not determined where the lightning had entered the barn.

Sternitzky said he was standing among the cows and felt nothing himself.