Reader Emphasizes Need for Cars to Slow Down During Sledding Season

Few articles I have written since starting on this adventure with the Morrisons Cove Herald have generated a positive response as the one published last week about snow sledding.

It seemed to bring a laugh and spark some memoirs for many readers.

But one reader chided me for missing an excellent opportunity to caution adults, especially drivers, to ease up on the accelerometer any time they spot a group of sledders.

“You never know where all of those kids are and one may be very close to the roadway,” the reader said.

She was spot on and the criticism hit close to home as my mind reeled back to a snowy Saturday morning in 1971.

Married just a few months, Sam and I were living in a single-wide, two-bedroom mobile home in Stone Manor, Martinsburg.

He was working at Fonda in Williamsburg and I was working in Altoona. We each had an afternoon to evening shift, but mechanical difficulties left us with one car.

The plan was for me to drive him to his job at Fonda then head to Altoona for my shift.

At days end I would swing back down Rt. 220 pick him up then head back to Martinsburg.

A heavy snow of a few days prior left the ground well covered, but the roadways were clear making travel easy.

We were traveling in a ten-year-old Plymouth Valiant down Piney Creek when something happened that I will never forget.

Almost to Williamsburg with no other traffic on the highway, a wooden runner sled literally flew off the top of an overhanging bank.

The sled struck the front of the old Valiant and splintered into a thousand pieces.

The runners and some of the intact wood flew onto the windshield and over the top of the car landing on Piney Creek Road behind us.

I gripped the steering wheel and started to cry, I was so afraid I had killed a child who had been on the sled.

We got out of the car and walked back to the scene to be greeted by a group of children telling us that all was okay and waving us on.

The child had the sense to roll off the sled before it hit the drop off.

That was 52 years ago and to this day I re-live the whole incident as I travel that section of roadway to Williamsburg.

I recall the splintering on the grill and watching as the runners hit the windshield.

But most of all, I recall those seconds of heart stopping terror at the thought that my traveling down the road at that time may have ended a child’s life.

While I had no way of knowing the children were sledding on the hill above, I always slow down and watch carefully as I pass children on sleds.