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Friday, August 31, 2018

18-Year-Old Scalded to Death at Work, 1933

“Raymond Pardue Scalded to Death,” from the Journal-Patriot, North Wilkesboro, N.C., Thursday, Aug. 31, 1933

Dies in Explosion at W.E. Sale Cannery in Little Elkin Community

Raymond Delany Pardue, almost 19, son of Mr. and Mrs. D.G. Pardue of the Little Elkin community, was fatally scalded by steam in an explosion while firing a boiler at the W.E. Sale cannery, three miles west of Elkin, early yesterday morning. He died at Hugh Chatham Memorial hospital, Elkin, about noon.

George Poplin Jr., son of Mr. and Mrs. George Poplin of Ronda, also an employe of the cannery, was painfully burned and bruised in the explosion.

Young Pardue, late in reaching his post, is said to have fired the boiler too rapidly for the pop off valve to take care of the excess steam. When the boiler gave away directly over the fire box, the steam covered Pardue’s body, scalding it horribly before he was hurled 20 feet away by the force. Others at the plant sustained lighter burns.

Pardue and Poplin were carried to the hospital at Elkin, the former’s condition being beyond medical aid.

The victim was the eldest child of the family and a nephew of W.E. Sale, proprietor of the cannery. Surviving are his parents, two sisters and a brother.

Funeral rites will be conducted today at 2 o’clock at Little Elkin Baptist church.

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