Eberhardt v. Glasgow Mutual Telephone Ass'n

Citations

• 91 Kan. 763
• 139 P. 416
• 1914 Kan. LEXIS 116

Syllabus

<p>SYLLABUS BY THE COURT.</p> <p>Personal Injuries — Runaway Team — Telephone Guy Wire— Not the “Proximate Cause.” A mutual telephone company placed in the highway, practically upon the north line, a telephone pole to which was attached a guy wire which extended diagonally into the highway, and four feet and four inches from such pole was attached to a brace driven into the ground. The highway was forty-four feet wide and the traveled portion was thirty feet wide. The space north of the traveled portion, in which the wire was anchored, was some six inches higher and was not smoothed, but was covered with grass and weeds. The plaintiff was riding in a wagon with her husband, who was driving a span of mules which had tried to run away at previous times. Meeting an automobile some twenty rods east of the pole and wire, the mules took fright and ran, veering to the right of the traveled way, and ran the wagon against the pole or wire — probably the latter— throwing the plaintiff out and injuring her. It is held that the telephone company was not negligent in locating the pole where it was, and whether negligent or not in respect to the wire, it was not liable, for the reason that the wire was not the proximate cause of the injury or one which might reasonably be expected to cause such injury.</p>