December 13th is around the corner, and I want to remember my great grandfather, Thomas Michael Higgins, roofer.
His father Edward owned a roofing business in Boston. Several members of the family worked there, and it wasn’t an easy job, by any means.
I’ve found one court case from 1905 that pitted one family member against another over injuries received while working, and evidence that the Roofer’s Protective Union in Boston assisted roofers by arguing for an eight hour work day in a controversy with Edward’s business.
And then this:
The Boston Daily Globe printed this about Thomas in December 1913:
Roofer Falls 25 Feet
Thomas Higgins of South Boston Suffers Contusions and Possible Skull Fracture in Quincy.
Quincy, Dec 13 – Thomas Higgins, 29, of 23 Lark st, South Boston, a roofer, was seriously and perhaps fatally injured this afternoon by a 25-foot fall from the roof of a house at 225 Arlington st, Wollaston. He suffered multiple contusions and a possible fracture of the skull. He was taken in the police ambulance to the Quincy City Hospital, where his case is reported dangerous.
He died 3 January, 1914 after a valiant battle, 97 years ago -- long before my mother was born. She remembers seeing a picture of him as a child sitting on a mantle and thought he was a handsome man.
Nobody knows where that picture is now, but I would love to find it.
