A Miami County Newspaper
September 19, 1927

ACCIDENT PROVES FATAL TO TIDEWATER EMPLOYEE

Cleo Fulk Burned to Death and Two Others in Hospital As Result of Accident Friday evening.

Cleo Stanley Fulk, 20, suffered a horrible death last Friday night, when flames from an explosion ignited his oil soaked clothing and burned them from 

his body. Two other workmen, Wm. Flick and Robert McLaren, were severely burned.

The men were completing a pipe line job for the Tidewater Oil Company and were making a tap on the Fisher place about four miles north of 

Covington. The tragedy occurred about 9:30 o'clock when the line was cut.

Mr. Flick was holding a lantern at a distance of about 10 feet, but the gas in the line was so strong that it ignited and a terrific explosion occurred which 

enveloped the men in a sheet of flame, the oil soaked garments of Fulk proving a veritable torch for the flames which burned them off his body before 

assistance could be rendered. Flick and McLaren who was the foreman of the job, escaped death but were severely burned.

The injured men were rushed to the Covington Hospital where Fulk passed away at 3:40 Saturday morning.

His parents, Mr. and Mrs. E. W. Fulk and his bride of four months, who reside at Coal City, Ind., were notified of the accident at once, and started 

immediately for Covington, but the young man had passed away before they arrived.

The body was taken to the Miller Funeral Parlors where it was prepared for burial and Mr. Russell Miller, accompanied by the grief stricken family for 

the home in Coal City arriving there at midnight. The funeral services were held today.

Mr. Fulk with two others, employed by the Tidewater Oil Co., had roomed with Mrs. Dan Minnich on S. High Street and had won a number of 

friends while here, and the sadness of his accidental death was felt by the whole community.

Reports from the Hospital today indicate that both of his companions are in critical condition. Of the two men it is said that McLaren was more 

severely burned than Flick.