Galena Daily Gazette
27 June 1890

Death in a Puddle

Willie O'Day Drowned on his Father's Farm

Willie O'Day, the 8-year old son of Patrick O'Day, living on the Gillson farm in East Galena, was drowned Thursday noon within sight of his own home and but a few hundred feet from where his father was at work. The little fellow with a 4-year old brother had carried his father's dinner to where the latter was at work in the field and were returning home when they stopped to play about a pool of water that had been formed in a little gully in the field. The younger brother was about to wade into the water when the other cautioned him that it might be too deep, and proposed to test it first himself. He waded in, but had gone only a few feet when he fell into a hole that had been created by the flood and sank to the bottom. The little brother ran to his father and told what had happened. The poor father hastened to the scene and in a few minutes brought to the surface the body of his boy, already past resuscitation, although he worked with the energy of despair to bring back life.

It was a sad duty for the grief-stricken father to bear the body of his boy in his own arms to his home and apprise the mother of what had happened, but he was alone and in their first moments of grief they had not even the comfort that sympathizing neighbors could give.

The funeral was held to-day, passing through Galena to the former home of the family at Vinegar Hill, where burial was made.


Submitted by Tim Doser