Leonard Black

LEONARD BLACK WAS ELEVEN YERAS OLD. He was born in June 1897 in New York. In 1900, he was living with his parents, Charles J. and Lucy “Lulu” Black, his brother Henry “Harry,” and his paternal grandfather, James, in Arizona Territory. By 1909, the family—now including a younger sister, Lucia—was living on upper Florence Avenue in Tonopah.

On Saturday morning, March 20, 1909, Leonard and his seventeen-year-old brother Harry climbed onto the top of a trail wagon loaded with three tons of grain. The wagon was being driven uphill to the Tonopah-Belmont Mine by nineteen-year-old Charley Bottomly. A team of two horses pulled the heavy load.

As the wagon reached the garage at the Belmont, it came to a sudden stop. Leonard lost his balance and fell from the freight, striking the tongue of the wagon before dropping directly in front of the wheels. Remarkably, he retained his presence of mind and cried out, “Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!” The horses nearly stopped—but not before one of the front wheels began to pass over his stomach. Leonard was pinned beneath it until his brother and Bottomly managed to back the wagon off him. Because it was a trail wagon, and the horses were not hitched in a way that allowed them to back up, the effort was slow and difficult.

Leonard was taken immediately to his home on Florence Avenue, where Dr. J. L. Garner of Rawhide happened to be visiting. After examining the boy, Dr. Garner believed the injuries were not fatal. The following morning, convinced Leonard was out of danger, he returned to Rawhide.

By that evening, Leonard’s condition worsened. Dr. McLeod was summoned, but all efforts proved futile. Leonard remained conscious through thirty hours of intense suffering before dying. His father, who was in Schurz on business, was notified and returned to Tonopah by train.

After funeral services at the Baptist Church, Leonard was buried on March 24, 1909. His coffin was escorted to the grave by his classmates. Students in the fifth through eighth grades, along with all high school students, were dismissed for the day so they could attend the burial in a body.

By 1910, Leonard’s family had moved to Schurz, where his father took up farming—leaving Leonard behind in Tonopah.

In the Old Tonopah Cemetery, Leonard Black lies where a moment’s imbalance and a wagon that could not back up ended a boyhood, while the town that mourned him quietly went on.