An elevator slid down its shaft at the Plimpton Manufacturing Company factory

1. The women had bruised their hands “catching at objects in the elevator shaft during the rapid descent” or “by striking against the chains.”
2. The article attributed the accident to the “heavy load” in the car.

The article reported that “an alarming story was circulated around town” that the elevator had fallen from the upper floor and that several people had been killed or wounded:  “Investigation showed that there was very little foundation for all of this.”

1. “Thereupon the car began to slide down at a somewhat rapid rate, but the ropes by which it is hoisted remaining unbroken, there was nothing like a fall.”
2. “The girls were all badly scared and one fainted, but there was little serious damage.”

Unattributed.  “An elevator scare,” Hartford Daily Courant, April 12, 1881, page 2.